"Seussical The Musical" by The Young Performers.

Duchess Theatre, Long Eaton.

The Cat in the Hat tells the fantastical story of Horton, an elephant who discovers a speck of dust containing Whos, including Jojo, a Who child sent off to military school for thinking too many "thinks." Horton faces a double challenge--not only must he protect the Whos from a world of naysayers and dangers, but he must also guard an abandoned egg, left to his care by the irresponsible Mayzie La Bird.

Although Horton faces ridicule, danger, kidnapping, and a trial, the intrepid Gertrude McFuzz never loses faith in him. The powers of friendship, loyalty, family, and community are challenged and emerge triumphant.

It's one of the most colourful and fun shows with the most fabulous and unbelievable of tales; let's face it, when was the last time that you heard of an elephant hatching out an egg up a tree?

It's also quite a landmark production for The Young Performers because this show will be the last show for quite a few of the young actors with this group.

When I first took a look at the programme and spotted that Finn Boswell had been cast as The Cat In The Hat, I knew that the show would be a good 'un with this choice of casting. Great, fun role which Finn took in his stride. He has a very comfortable stage presence and looked great in his black evening suit with that famous red and white striped hat.

Amelia Forecast and Livvy Read share the role of Jojo, the young Whos boy and Mayor's son who Horton hears on the head of a clover. Not sure whether it was Amelia or Livvy I saw tonight (Thursday), but they did a brilliant job, and again great fun to watch.

Horton the Elephant is played by Lewis McDowall. What I noticed with Lewis in this show is what a really distinctive voice he has which sounded great on his own and also really nice in his duet with Ella Charlesworth.

Heidi Parsons plays The Sour Kangaroo. I have seen a couple of productions where a separate actor plays the Sour Kangaroo's baby, but I think the decision to have Heidi carry with her a toy baby kangaroo made her scenes even cuter. Heidi's character may have the title "sour" but this performance was really quite sweet.

Mayzie La Bird was played by Neve Johnson who has an absolute gem of a voice, and I loved the characterization that Neve gives to this naughty bird.

Ella Charlesworth is another of those actors whose voice is always worth listening to, and especially in this role of Gertrude McFuzz, the bird with a short tail who asks the doctor for a finer plumage, and then realises that when she has what she wants is not really what she wants. Her unrequited love for her neighbour, Horton, is tenderly insinuated at in her song "Notice Me, Horton". Ella is one of those young performers who'll be stepping down from this group after this show, but I've seen Ella's past stage work and know that this won't be the last we see of this lovely lady on the stage of the Duchess Theatre.

Mr Mayor is played by Jamie Higgins, who I last saw playing the role of Little John in the Young Performers panto "Robin Hood & The babes In The Wood" at the start of the year. Jamie, like Lewis, has a really distinctive singing voice which I can't remember hearing from one so young. I'd gauge that in a few years time Jamie is going to have a fine bass/baritone voice with the right vocal training.  I would just offer one word of advice though, and that is to slow down just a tad with his delivery of the script, mainly so that we can hear the full richness of his voice.

Mrs Mayor is played with great enthusiasm by Millie Weston.

The Bird Girls are dressed to the nines and resemble the Flapper Girls of the 1920's/1930's, very sophisticated and sounded great. Evie Perks, Lucy Coulson-Jones, Isabella Frampton, Remy-Mae Read and Sophie Longcroft make up the Bird Girls.

The mischievous Wickersham Brothers are played by three young actors who I've seen several times over the last few years and always, separately and together, make me smile; Fin Tomlinson, Alex Povey and Daniel Swan.

Another actor who I've seen many times on stage over the last few years is Will Mellor who was commanding as General Genghis Kahn Scmitz, who was in charge of putting Jojo through his paces in the Whos army.

AJ Chamberlain played Yurtle The Turtle, which is a character that I can't remember seeing before in any other production of this musical.

Dillan Brookes plays The Grinch. There's a nice little cameo bit in this production that features The Grinch which highlights some nice comedy aspects that are presented with ease by Dillan.

 One of my favourite little actors that I've noted from other Young Performers shows is Elijah Green, who plays the Elephant Bird in this show. He almost erupts out of the egg at the end, and with quite a few of these actors moving on up, this might mean that we see Eljah in some bigger roles as he is a joy to watch on stage.

The Whos and Jungle Animals are played by Carly gaunt, Emily Wilkins, Clarissa Armitage, Emily-Mae Taylor, Emmie Simmons, Jess Henshaw, Keeley Rickerby, Olivia Monk and Violet Graney.

Directed by Vicky Byrne, she has really brought the energy out of this group, as well as the fun element, both of which makes this production absolutely fly.

This is one hell of an energetic show and not least where the dancing is concerned. Choreographed by Lottie Ludlow this cast must lose pounds every night from the amazing choreography. There are all styles of dance and I loved the jive sequence where the kicks and flicks were so sharp. Oh and then there's the Latin section, and with those costumes. As one dance expert would say A MAY ZING dahlings! The ensemble during these choreographed pieces were incredible.

Set design is by Roydon Charlesworth. It's set on two very colourful levels which allows loads of space to house this large cast, when they are all on stage at the same time.

The Musical Support is Ben Ward and sounds great. Some of these songs are not the easiest to sing, but with support from Ben, these young actors brought life to this soundtrack. There's some catchy tunes in this musical; tunes like "Oh The Thinks You Can Think", "How Lucky You Are" and "Green Eggs And Ham".

The sound tonight was by The Young Techies: Eva O'Riordan, Gizel Chaparova, Lewis Cuthbert, Maddie Taft and Olivia Michaud. Sound is always the most difficult aspect of a show to get spot on, and there were a few issues tonight, but first night, in my opinion is always the most difficult to get right because the auditorium always slightly distorts the sound as the music and voices bounce off of a full auditorium. This is something that you can only plan so far for in technical rehearsals. There are a lot of bodies on stage all with various mic packs and there are loads of sliders that need to be operated, often at the same time. This group haven't been doing this for that long, but they are doing a fantastic job and are learning as they go with each new production. And where would any production be without the sound superstars?

From start to finish this is the most colourful of musicals. I've seen less impressive and colourful light shows in nightclubs. It is an explosion of colour, and all thanks to Dave Martin.

This must be one hell of a fantastical job to stage manage but Stage Managers and Crew Roydon Charlesworth, Paul Wheddon and the Young Techies did a very smooth job of it.

Now, I must also mention just how amayzing the costumes are in this show. There were pink flamingoes, matching brown monkey costumes, The Cat's slick suit as well as all of the other animal costumes that didn't leave you guessing what they were, and all thanks to Sarah Charlesworth.

An array of props managed by Fiona McDowall.

The show was produced by Zak Charlesworth who also designed the artwork.

If ever there was a cure of the blues, then this show is that. If the NHS could prescribe a medicine for feeling down, then this production would cure all in just two hours flat.

"Seussical the Musical" is at The Duchess Theatre in Long Eaton until Saturday 21 June.