Category: Children's
Date: 11.06.2006
Printable version
26.06.06
Note - the part of the Palace Maid was
subsequently played by Meera Syal rather than Julie Walters.
Julie Walters, Jonathan Ross, Harry Hill, Martin Clunes, Ronnie Corbett, Bradley
Walsh and Patsy Kensit head a stellar cast for the Children's Party at the
Palace, an extraordinary celebration of British children's literature in
honour of Her Majesty the Queen's 80th Birthday.
Julie Walters plays a palace Maid, Jonathan Ross plays
Sir Topham Hat, Harry Hill plays Hogwarts Owl Keeper, Martin Clunes
plays PC Plod, Ronnie Corbett plays Mr Tibbs, Bradley Walsh plays
Burglar Bill, Patsy Kensit plays The Grand High Witch, and Kelly
Osbourne plays Wendy.
Over 30 stars of stage and screen will join some of Britain's best-loved literary characters including Mary Poppins, Rupert the Bear, Winnie the Pooh, Paddington, The BFG, Postman Pat, Mrs Tiggywinkle, Noddy and the Gruffalo for this unique extravaganza.
An exclusive scene starring four of the leading characters from Harry Potter has
also been written especially for the drama and will include Harry, played by
Daniel Radcliffe, Hermione (Emma Watson), Ron (Rupert Grint) and Neville (Matthew
Lewis).
The live show entitled The Queen's Handbag will be played in the gardens of
Buckingham Palace on a huge stage in front of the Queen's 3,000 guests on BBC ONE and The CBBC Channel on 25 June.
More than eighty characters from the world of literature will be gathering together for the dramatisation written by children's author and playwright David
Wood OBE with Julian Fellowes as Executive Script Editor and Sir
Trevor Nunn as stage director.
The inspirational play brings together everyone's favourite
characters from the world of literature for the first and probably
only time ever.
The exact storyline remains a closely guarded secret, but revolves around a
timeless baddies verses goodies plot...
The Queen has invited characters from the
world of literature to the palace to help celebrate her birthday.
But, just as
everyone starts to arrive Mary, the Queen's maid, her butler Mr Tibbs and Sophie
from The BFG realise the Queen's handbag which contains her speech has gone.
Sophie (played by herself Sophie Dahl) had The BFG written for her by her
grandfather. In the book Sophie went to live with the Queen and the story joins
her as an adult still living with the Queen helping to send out invites to the
party.
They desperately try and find the handbag with the help of some other characters
including PC Plod, Robin Hood and Peter Pan but some of the characters are out
to cause mischief.
The baddies - including Burglar Bill, the Grand High Witch, and
Captain Hook - try and sabotage the party by stopping guests from arriving.
Will the Queen find her speech in time for the party or
will the baddies ruin it for everyone?
Also confirmed to star in the play are Kasey
Ainsworth (Little Mo from Eastenders), Sam
Aston (Chesney Battersby-Brown from Coronation Street), Sanjeev Bhaskar, June Brown and Pam St Clement (Dot Cotton and Pat Evans from Eastenders), Dani Harmer (Tracy Beaker), Anthony Head, Richard O'Brian, Joe Pasquale, Alan Titchmarsh, and the Blue Peter presenters Matt Baker, Konnie Huq, Zoe Salmon, Gethin
Jones and Meg the dog.
BBC executive producer of the Children's Party at the Palace, Lorna Dickinson,
said: "I am delighted that so many stars of stage, screen and literature are
coming together for this once in a lifetime event.
"We're also privileged to
have such a fantastic production team working on making this show something
special for everyone to remember.
"I'm sure the Children's Party at the Palace
will go down in history as a fantastic celebration of children's literature and
of the Queen's 80th birthday."
Two thousand children and 1,000 adults from all across the UK will be joining the
celebrations at Buckingham Palace for this once-in-a-lifetime event.
They were
selected as part of a ballot process on bbc.co.uk/cbbc which saw the greatest
response to a CBBC online competition ever.
The Children's Party at the Palace will be broadcast on BBC ONE and The CBBC
Channel on Sunday 25 June from 6.15 to 7.30pm (until 7.00pm on CBBC).
KH
