“It is an old maxim of mine that when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.”
Sherlock Holmes in The Adventure of the Beryl Coronet (by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Any narrative ‘worth its salt’ – regardless of how fantastical its premise – should have a subtext that illuminates its true meaning. In the case of The Cottingley Fairies, it’s not really about two girls taking pictures of the ‘wee folk’ at the bottom of their garden. It’s quite literally ‘a fairy tale’ that at the time caught the imagination of the local community and the rest of the UK – and imbued it with a life and longevity of its own.

The show begins in April 1917, with young Frances Griffiths (Nicole Cammack) and her mother Annie (Gwen Pritchard-Thomas) travelling from South Africa to visit their relatives in the village of Cottingley, west Yorkshire. There, Frances meets her older cousin Elsie Wright (Blaize Middleton) and while amusing themselves in the back garden, take photos to help ‘prove’ that Frances has indeed seen fairies there… But instead of everyone realising this as a hoax or a bit of harmless fun, neighbours claim they’ve seen fairies too. News of this ‘phenomenon’ reaches Edward Gardner (Zach Went) – a leading member of the Theosophy Society, who in turn contacts Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (Scott Hawthorne), the world-famous author of the Sherlock Holmes stories. His advocacy of the photos’ authenticity gives them and the story a newfound legitimacy. Now the story… the lie… is too big to come clean with. Not without ‘losing face’ and making everyone who believes in the photos look gullible and foolish –including Elsie’s mother and father, Polly and Arthur (Isla Jones/Caitlyn Hamilton)…

Developed by Clare Packham (writer/lyrics) and Fintan Kealy (composer/lyrics) for British Youth Musical Theatre (BYMT) and Birmingham Hippodrome, The Cottingley Fairies is proof that shows that feature children/young people can work on multiple levels, with nuanced or mature themes. With direction by Ewa Dina and choreography by Hannah Fairclough, the show is anything but twee in tone. Musically, the show doesn’t rely on clichés or anything that hints of the early 20th century. Instead, it takes an alternative folk score with a tinge of 1970s rock. Sometimes the musicians in similar shows are ‘invisible’ (either ‘literally’ or not foremost on one’s mind) when the audience is taking everything in. But I was impressed on the night with the score, and the skill of Jacob Savage and rest of the musicians performing.

Looking at the premise of The Cottingley Fairies, it’s an event that has many applicable metaphors and questions that nobody asks in the real world today. Most Western nations think it is perfectly normal to encourage children to believe in Father Christmas/Santa Claus, but when is the ‘cut off’ date for putting away ‘childish things’ and to instead be more ‘cynical’? On a more serious note, if adults buy into ‘a lie’ – a narrative/belief that children know is ‘suspect’, are we really teaching the next generation that ‘truth’ should be silenced so no one ‘rocks the boat’? It’s all food for thought…

In ensemble productions, it’s important that everyone gets a chance to shine, and all the actors/singers and dancers here do (including ‘grown-up’ versions of Elsie and Frances (Fern Mellor, Danielle Kelly-Honey). Historical figures also feature, such as Harry Houdini (Daniela Valencia), who in this show, claims to know a thing or two about misdirection and ‘achieving the impossible’. As for the dancers – as a visual spectacle – the ‘parading’ of the faerie folk during ‘their’ moments are evocative of Powell and Pressburger’s The Red Shoes – a fevered, next-level homage to A Midsummer Night’s Dream…

© Michael Davis 2026

The Cottingley Fairies ran at the Patrick Studio of the Birmingham Hippodrome from 10th to 12th April.

https://www.birminghamhippodrome.com/calendar/bymt-the-cottingley-fairies/#performances