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INCLUDES LINKS TO

DOWNLOADABLERESOURCES

www.roalddahl.com www.davidwood.org.uk

I’ve jam-packed this online resource with

things for you to enjoy a

nd to help you

learn some things that I think might be

useful. I’m going to take you on a journey

with me through this theatre pr

oduction of

my story where you will get some inside

information on how we are going to make

the magic come alive for audiences to

see. You’ll get to meet the actor

s and the

director, designers and composer along

the way. Maybe you will have some ideas to

share with me as we go?Are you

ready?

Hi I’m George!

FOR TEACHERS AND GROWN UPS (HOW TO USE THIS)This online resource has been developed for young learners to engage with the story of George’s Marvellous Medicine as a stage production. It can also be used as a practical reference for investigating aspects of the novel by Roald Dahl. The resource is narrated by George and will be released in three stages:Contextual information The authors, the story and the characters.Themes, ideas and activities Inventors, Environment, Sounds and Music, Language, Family

From Page to Stage Putting together the theatre productionThere are links to facts and visual material, as well as links to video and audio sources.

PAGEONE

I have lots of different dreams, sometimes I’d like to be a magician, and then I think it would be wonderful to be an inventor, or a doctor, or a writer, or even a spy. My mum says I’ve got plenty of time to learn about all of these things and I thought perhaps you would like to find out more too?Along with my undercover detective work on the theatre production of my story (I really would make a great spy), I’ve included some letters that I wrote to the authors, my diary and excellent links to some activities, facts, music and video. You just need to click on the Download link as you go.

For young inventors (how to use this)

There are links to PDF’s that can be printed for your use. There are also behind the scenes video and audio material that you can access to help prepare young learners for a visit to the theatre.Click on this icon and it will take you to the PDF’s, audio or visual material and this will be added throughout the rehearsal process for the production.

Before we start, I thought it might be a marvellous idea to find out more about who created my story in the first place and how it came to be an action packed production for the theatre. Roald Dahl wrote the children’s book and then David Wood decided it would make a brilliant play. I

wrote Mr Dahl a letter asking some questions and I was lucky enough to interview Mr Wood. This is what I discovered…

PAGETWO

Dear Mr Dahl,I’m so happy that you decided to write a story about the making of my Marvellous Medicine. And it’s wonderful that Mr Wood has made this story into a script so that it can be performed in the theatre for lots of children and grown ups to enjoy. I wonder what it was like when you were growing up? I did wonder about what you meant when you say ‘For Doctors everywhere’, I’d really like to be a doctor - how marvellous to make medicines that can really help people. I’m not entirely sure if being a doctor is the right job for me. I’d also like to do something adventurous like fly a plane or invent a new machine that would make life easier on the farm.

My mum and dad are still very busy running the farm - they ask me to help them all the time, did your family ever give you any peace and quiet?Anyway, what I really wanted to ask was do you think there might be the possibility of a second book? Like George’s Mighty Machine or George’s Magical Map? Perhaps I could ask the young inventors and their grown ups to write one?Yours Sincerely George (and Pinky, Perky, Chico and Bernie from the Farm)

Click on this icon to find out more about Roald Dahl

PAGETHREE

Thank you for coming to talk to me today Mr Wood,

why did you want to make my story into a marvellous

play for the theatre?

Well, George, I had already written several plays based

on stories by Roald Dahl. These plays featured your

young colleagues, Sophie, Boy, James and Danny, so I

thought it was unfair that I shouldn’t write a play on your

story! Like most of Roald Dahl’s brilliant stories, there

is something theatrical about the adventure in which you

create a marvellous, magical medicine. Stories featuring

magic often work well on stage, and I also find that stories

with a really good ‘baddie’ get the audiences emotions

working. We all tend to get hot under the collar about

things that are unfair. And certainly your grandmother is

a very unpleasant person, who treats you badly. We all

want you to succeed in your quest to make her ‘better’.

Furthermore I thought that your family, George, would

be really interesting to see on stage. Your mother and

father are very real people with real problems. Your father

works very hard on the farm, your mother works hard too,

but also has the problem of her ‘difficult’ mother (your

grandmother) to contend with. Many families are like this

in real life. But none of them experience the excitement of

the extraordinary events leading from your brilliant idea to

create your marvellous medicine. Finally, I always enjoy

having animals in my plays. Although these animals don’t

talk or carry the main threads of the story – as the animals

do in, for instance, FANTASTIC MR FOX – they are very

important and, most of all, fun, particularly when your

magic so dramatically changes them!

What things are different from the book written by

Roald Dahl? Is it exactly the same story?

When writing the play, I tried very hard to be faithful to

Roald Dahl’s story, and I think I succeeded. Anyone who

knows the book will certainly recognise nearly everything

they see on the stage. But I did add a section at the

beginning. I gave your story, George, what is sometimes

called a ‘back story’. That means that we start off a little

while before Roald Dahl’s story starts. We meet you and

your parents, but your Grandma isn’t already living with

you. We hear that she is coming to stay, because she has

been unwell and needs to rest and be looked after. This

sends your family into turmoil, because everybody knows

that your Grandma is difficult and often unpleasant. Not

only that, she will have to have your bedroom, George,

because there is no spare bedroom in the house. So you

have to give up your room and sleep in a small box room.

The reason I have added this section is to make quite sure

that the audience appreciates and sympathises with your

problem, George. So, when you decide to try to make

Grandma better, by creating your marvellous medicine,

we, sitting in the audience, all agree with your plan and are

willing to help you carry it out. I certainly didn’t want to

make you seem like a nasty boy who is simply being cruel

to his grandmother. So I put in a scene where your real

Grandma, the nasty one, is suddenly, in your imagination,

transformed into a lovely, generous, warm Grandma, the

one that you – and all the audience – would love to have.

How did you become a writer for the theatre?

The theatre, both performing and writing, was something

I became interested in when I was very young. I was ten

years old when I wrote plays for my own puppet theatre. In

my early teens I wrote songs. I also started performing in

public, singing songs and doing magic tricks. By the time

I was twelve I was doing magic at children’s parties. At

university I did some more writing for theatre shows and

did a lot of acting, which led to me becoming a professional

actor. Then a theatre where I was performing asked me to

write the Christmas play. That was exactly fifty years ago,

believe it or not! Since then I have written many plays for

young audiences, plus a number of children’s books. But

the theatre is where I feel I belong.

Have you ever invented anything?

If you count the creation of new stories, I suppose I have

invented things. But I cannot claim to have invented

anything as clever or remarkable as your medicine, George.

It seems to me that the success of Roald Dahl’s story about

you and your family confirms my belief in the importance

of creativity in all our lives, and certainly in education.

Learning facts is important, but so is the opportunity to

think up ideas and stories and poems and plays and games,

and to act out our stories, or paint them in pictures or

words. We all need stories. The whole world needs stories.

No matter what age we are. So I’d like everybody to be

allowed enough time to think, to dream, to create – to use

their imaginations.

www.davidwood.org.uk/index.htm

I think I would also make a great

journalist, so I made my interview

with Mr Wood into a news article.

Click on this icon to download an activity PDF.

PAGEFOUR

SCENE ONEWHERE – George’s Den WHEN – Early in the morning- SunriseI’m trying to read this really great book about Billy the Wizard but my Mum and Dad keep interrupting me, they need help milking the cows, feeding the chickens and getting the bull back in the field. I haven’t got School today but they have to keep working to keep the farm running. I wish I could play with my friends from the village but it’s too far away instead I have the pigs Pinky and Perky to talk to instead.Everything is going well until mum gets a letter to say that Grandma is going to come and stay and is arriving today. And worse of all, she has to stay in my bed!

There’s a lot of thing

s that happen in my story an

d in the play

this is divided into scenes so that

the actors and director ca

n

rehearse it more easily

. There are some things t

hat I think are

going to be pretty am

azing to see on the

stage. Like how on

earth is grandma going to gro

w and what about all of th

e farm

animals? I wrote a diary about all of th

e things that happe

ned.

Read it and see if you have an

y ideas about making my story

into an action pack

ed theatre production?

SCENE TWOWHERE – The house WHEN – 9amGrandma arrives with lots of luggage and starts bossing us all around, she tells us about the medicine the she take 3 times a day and mum puts it in a safe place. Grandma has a bell that she rings if she needs anything and she says that when she rings it we have to go and help her. But thankfully she has a nap so I can carry on reading my book about Billy.

SCENE THREEWHERE – George’s Bedroom and the Kitchen WHEN – 10amJust as I’m getting back into my book the bell rings. Oh no! Grandma! She tells me to make her a cup of tea and doesn’t even say thank you when I give it to her. She is so mean and bossy that I imagine what it might be like if she was a nice, sweet and fun Grandma and while I am day dreaming she rings her bell again. When I go to find out what she wants this time, she tells me I’m growing too fast and that I should eat cabbage and not chocolate (can you believe it?). She really starts to frighten me and I think perhaps she might actually be a real life witch. I get away from her and she falls asleep again. I wish I could find a way of making her disappear. I start thinking about all the ways I could get Grandma back. Perhaps I could frighten her with a ghost mask, or rats or a snake? But I don’t think this wold really work so I start to think about ways that I can make Grandma nicer instead. Just as I think I can relax and read my book again mum asks me to make the beds, clean the bathroom and worse of all give grandma her medicine at One O Clock. Then dad asks me to muck out the chickens and so I have to give up on reading my brilliant book. There’s no rest on the farm. Then I have this amazing idea, what if I made a magic medicine to cure Grandma? To make her nicer? But the problem is the ingredients for a magic medicine are tricky to find. I have another idea- I can put ANYTHING into the medicine. I get to work straight away.

SCENE FOURWHERE – In the bathroom, Mum and Dad’s Bedroom, The Shed and the Kitchen WHEN – 12pmI start to make my medicine (Our medicine really). The only rule is that I mustn’t use anything from the actual medicine cabinet, that is strictly out of bounds. I find a large Saucepan in the kitchen and nearly get caught by Grandma- I’m going to have to keep quiet if I’m going to pull this off. So I creep around the house adding ingredients as I go. First the bathroom, and then the bedroom, then I head to the Kitchen and finally find lots of great ingredients in the shed. The only problem is the mixture is blue and I need it to be brown. I find some brown paint and add a bit of the actual medicine and boil it all up, say a magic rhyme and it turns brown. It’s ready!

PAGEFIVE

SCENE SIXWHERE – The Farm Yard WHEN – 1.30pm (lunchtime)Even though Grandma is now giant, she still makes us run around after her, and she has her lunch. I have to climb up a ladder to give it to her, that’s how tall she is. My Dad has big plans to make more of the medicine to sell to other farmers, so that it will help to end hunger and make lots of money. The only thing is is that I can’t remember everything that I put into it!

SCENE SEVENWHERE – All the rooms in the house WHEN – 2.00pmDad has an idea to go back into all of the rooms that I went in when I made the medicine to try and remember what I put in. We start with the bathroom, then the bedroom, then the Kitchen and finally the shed. We boil the mixture up, and when it’s ready we feed it to one of the chickens.

SCENE EIGHTWHERE – The Farmyard WHEN – 3pmBut just it’s legs get longer (and chicken’s legs are not enough to eat!). I remember that we forgot to say the magic spell. So we try again but this time with the spell, It looks like it’s going to work, only the Cockerels neck gets longer (that’s no use!). I must’ve forgotten something else! What could it be? Then I remember that I forgot to put in grandmas’s actual medicine- thankfully mum had just picked some up when she went shopping. We try it all again. With the magic spell, the medicine all remembered. Surely this has got to work? We try it on a chicken and it starts to shrink until finally it disappears!

SCENE NINEWHERE – the Farm yard WHEN – 4pmDad is really disappointed. I wonder what I have forgotten? I’m trying to think when Grandma rings her bell. She wants a cup of tea. She sees that I’m holding the new medicine (the shrinking one) in a tea cup and thinks it’s tea. Grandma insists that I give it to her, so I climb up the ladder and she drinks it. She starts to shrink until she is back to her usual size, and then keeps on shrinking until she disappears.

SCENE TENWHERE – George’s Den, The Farm Yard WHEN – 6pm (Supper time)Everyone is a little shocked at first, but soon we start to think that it’s much more peaceful on the farm without Grandma, and I can get back to reading my book about Billy the Wizard knowing that I have magic powers all of my own.

SCENE FIVEWHERE – Grandma’s room (that is really my room!) WHEN – 1pm (on the dot)I give Grandma her medicine and the most amazing thing happens. She shoots up in the air and falls back down again, then she starts to smoke and says her tummy is on fire. I get the fire extinguisher (perhaps I should be a fire fighter?). I think it’s all over but then Grandma starts to grow taller and taller until she goes through the roof, with a long neck and long legs and her long arms reaching out. Grandma tries to say it was her powers that did this but I showed her by giving the medicine to Chico the Chicken that it was my medicine that made this happen! The Chicken becomes huge just in time for mum and dad to come home. Mum faints and dad can’t believe his luck. We try the medicine on some of the other animals and before you know it we have giant animals and a giant grandma wrecking our Farm. It’s time to take a breather. This is where you will have the interval of the play, I wonder what will happen next?

I’d love to be a Spy like Roald Dahl, I’ve been doing some snooping to see what I could find out about my family. Pretty interesting stuff. I wonder if you could make a spy profile about me?

The character

s in the sto

ry

- My Family

PAGESIX

NAME

KILLY KRANKY

AGE – 35

LIVES – Kranky Farm

OTHER FAMILY MEMBERS – Mary Kranky

(wife), George Kranky (Son) and Grandma

(Mother in law).

OCCUPATION – Farmer

HOBBIES – Too busy for hobbies.

LIKES – Making plans, apple pie, making things.

DISLIKES – Mucking out the chicken because they

peck, working every day.

AMBITION – To make money from the farm so that I

can employ a farm hand and have a day off.

NAME

MARY KRANKYAGE – Won’t say but says she is younger than dad.LIVES – Kranky FarmOTHER FAMILY MEMBERS – Killy Kranky (Husband), George Kranky (Son) and Grandma (Mother in law).OCCUPATION – Farmer and environmental scientist.HOBBIES – Tennis, rock climbing, geology.LIKES – Finding ways to make the farm more environmentally friendly, sensible ideas.DISLIKES – When people don’t recycle, when Grandma comes to stay.AMBITION – To enjoy the peace of the country side and find ways to protect the environment.

NAME

GRANDMAAGE – Ancient- at least 105 I would guess.

LIVES – Usually in the City.

OTHER FAMILY MEMBERS – George

Kranky (Grandson), Mary Kranky (Daughter)

Killy Kranky (Son in Law) Grandpa (Husband-

no longer with us).

OCCUPATION – Former Witch (possibly?).

HOBBIES – Sleeping, drinking tea, doing

very little.

LIKES – Tea, sleeping.

DISLIKES – Children growing, chocolate, the

countryside.

AMBITION – To do as little as possible, and

get everyone else to run around for her.

Click on this to

make your own

spy profile