"Chitty Chitty Bang Bang" by Christchurch Theatre Company.

Loughborough Town Hall.

The story of inventor Caractacus Potts, his two children, Jeremy and Jemima and his father, Mr Potts senior. Caractacus saves an old racing car from being sold to the scrap man and works his magic and creates a car that can float and fly. Meanwhile news has spread to the Baron and Baroness of Vulgaria and they send their two hapless spies to retrieve the car for the Baron.

The spies Goran and Boris mistake Potts senior for the inventor and sky lift him over to the Baron, followed by Caractacus, the children and Truly Scrumptious, to Vulgaria, a place where children are banned and caught by the evil child catcher. With the help of the Toy Maker a happy ending for all is promised with just a little team work, which obviously makes this dream work.

Caractacus Potts is played by Ben Burgess. Ben brings out the warmth of the character, and the loving and protective father, the devoted son as well as the down to earth inventor; all the things that Truly found endearing to her, in the exact way that the film did when portrayed by Dick Van Dyke. At the start, I did think that Ben may have been just a bit too young to portray Caractacus, after all he doesn't look too much older than the Potts kids, but his mature acting and musical theatre voice ensured that he Caract the role with energy and enthusiasm, and without Van Dyke's cockney brogue.

Truly Scrumptious is played by Anja Zeman. Apart from Anja being truly scrumptious to look, her voice is as clear as crystal and her acting skills bring both a softness as well as a natural mirror to the pairing of Caractacus and Truly. I have always loved the scene in the palace where Truly and Caractacus are disguised as the Baron's birthday dolls and this scene was beautifully choreographed and played out on stage. Love the POSH accent, which of course went well with Truly's background and heritage.

Mr Potts Senior is played by Duncan Gadsby who completely captured the eccentricity of the character. It's so nice to see Duncan back on stage itself with this brilliantly comical role instead of being part of the set and the scenery.

The young Potts, Jeremy and Jemima (Henry, Lily, Amelie and George), played on Thursday night by Team Truly's pair, George Consterdine and Lily Cain. This pair, as I am sure Amelie Vickers and Henry Langley are, not stage shy and showed brilliant character acting, chemistry and confidence, alongside some pretty impressive vocals.

Lord Scrumptious, who we only saw in a couple of scenes, is played by Ashley Bright, but the scene where Caractacus is promoting his Toot Sweets to Truly's father is vital and worthy of mentioning.

The Toy Maker, played in the original film by Benny Hill, is played by Al Jordan, who delivers playfulness as well as an air of mystery in this role.

The two foreign spies, Boris and Goran are played excellently by Jarrod Makin and Isaac Banda. As with the Baron and Baroness, this is another wonderful pair of comic characters from the pen of Ian Fleming, and Jarrod and Isaac bring forth every ounce of comic fun, and I love their accents, the fun costumes and I noticed that some of their lines were quite topical as well. I enjoyed how Nick Sutcliffe, the Director, had them popping up from all over the place. keeping the audience on their toes.

Baron Bomburst is played by Jonathan Penton with Baroness Bomburst  played by Gemma Farnell. As in the film the characters are comedy gold, as are all the pairings in this musical and Jonathan and Gemma add that extra shine to the gold on stage. There are also some topical lines from the Baron regarding invading lands for no reason - mmm I wonder who that could be having a gentle dig at? And also a mention of Bernard Matthews, the only time you'll hear me mention turkey in the same sentence as Jonathan and Gemma!

The evil Child Catcher is played by Hannah Osgood and like any panto style baddie, her appearance completely changed the whole atmosphere from the audience. I remember seeing the film as a young boy and this character sent shivers down my spine. The visual image is enough to have you cowering behind a cushion, and Hannah brings back all of those feelings deliciously, although I now don't hide my face behind a pillow... well not in the theatre anyway. The physicality she brings to the character is almost spider-like, as if she is poised like a tightly coiled spring, just ready to pounce on a rogue child.

The large ensemble consisted of Ashley Bright, Daisy Bright, Alison Darlow-Carter, Maddie Dunstan, Guy French, Nicky Hignett, Al Jordan, Paul Marriott, Amy McMurray, Laura Moore, Hannah Osgood, Jonah Robinson, Julie Robinson, Jayne Sanderson, Naomi Sandford, Millie Stapleford and Laura Tindle. Where would we be without an ensemble in any theatre production, and this ensemble show they are worth their weight in gold.

Team Truly consist of Rio Hatcher (Toby), Caleb Johnston (Steven), Lyla McMurray (Marta), Arla-Rae Neale (Greta), Darcy Peaty (Susan) and Edie Peaty (Girl).

Team Scrumptious is made up of Ezra Hinsley-Sarkar (Toby), Riley Bailey (Steven), Evie Robinson (Marta), Esmae-Rose Goodwin (Greta), Isabelle Clarke (Susan) and Ell-J Thurman (Girl).

The children's ensemble consist of two teams; Team Truly and Team Scrumptious......

Team Truly, the team on stage on Thursday night, consisted of Izzy Jewitt, Izzy Murray, Amelia Rees and Abigail Rundle-Brown.

Team Scrumptious consisted of Rosy Allen, Ruby Davenport, Lilian McFerran and Brooke Wingfield.

A fresh and punchy direction by Nick Sutcliffe, matches the wonderful choreography by Frankie Johnson. One of my favourite choreographed sections from the film is the iconic fairground scene and the song "Me Ol' Bamboo" which is possibly the most energetic and technically difficult piece to perform live on stage, but Ben and the ensemble just made it look like it is something they do every day.

You'll instantly remember most of the songs from the production, "Toot Sweets", "Truly Scrumptious","Hushabye Mountain", "Me Ol Bamboo", "Chu Chi Face", "Doll On A Music Box" and of course the title song. Musical Director is Vicky Hing, and as soon as I saw her name in the programme a tingle went through me because I know the standard of MD'ing you get with Vicky, and I was not wrong. Powerful, whimsical, lush, pacy, all adjectives I'd pin to the musical side of this show with Vicky in charge of the baton. The acoustics at Loughborough Town Hall have always been brilliant and the twelve piece orchestra sounded as good as anything I have heard in any theatre.

The set design and car hire were provided by Chitty Hire; again if you hire and work with the best, you get the best. Both set and car are pure magic and that's what you get in this show; magic.

Background Cloths by Scenic Projects.

Costumes for this show must go into the hundreds, or so they seem. The cast and ensemble number greatly so with just one costume there's plenty to wardrobe manage, but they all looked absolutely spiffing. Costumes by Charades - Theatrical Costume Hire of St Helens.

Sound Designer is David Phillips. No mic issues at all and a lovely balanced all round sound that made the show a really pleasant experience.

Lighting Designer is by James Cladingboel and Ben Bradshaw and Laura Hambleton worked magic with the follow spots.

Anyone who has seen, been involved or spoken at length about this musical will know that it's a big production. I know that everyone, from the Director to the cast and the backstage team could not have done any more than they have done on stage this week. It's always been one of my favourite childhood stories - I even had a metal Chitty car with retractable wings when I was a kid, and it very quickly became one of my favourite musicals, and CTC have just reinforced why I love this bang banger of a musical as much as I do.

"Chitty Chitty Bang Bang is at Loughborough Town Hall until Saturday 24 January.