Photo Flash: THE GRUFFALO Welcomes Schoolchildren to the Theatre

Tall Stories Theatre Company is to offer free tickets for The Gruffalo Live to primary school teachers across London in a bid to encourage schools to bring schoolchildren back to the theatre. Scroll down for photos of two schools attending the show!

In recent years, the company have noticed a fall in weekday term time attendance across a range of their family productions. To combat this, Tall Stories are introducing The Gruffalo Live Free Teacher Tickets Initiative with the aim of inspiring teachers into boosting the numbers of term time visits to the theatre. Primary schools across the capital will be eligible to apply for two tickets for teachers to visit weekday performances of the production this summer with the hope they will return with their classes in the autumn.

Toby Mitchell, Co-Artistic Director of Tall Stories recently spoke out in support of a new scheme launched in Scotland for every primary schoolchild to have the chance to see at least one Live Theatre performance a year.

He said 'The decreasing number of schools willing to take children on trips to the theatre is an area of concern that should be addressed more urgently. Tall Stories' aim is to get kids into theatres because it makes it more of a sense of occasion. It's special, they're excited, they're going out of school and they are experiencing theatre as adults do.'

In addition to this, last week, the company announced The Gruffalo Live Free Schools' Tickets Initiative, where 300 school children from London's primary schools will be given the chance to see the production for free.

This further ties in with Tall Stories' Future Perfect project where the actors from The Gruffalo Live will be delivering a brand new interactive performance free of charge to inner London schools. Future Perfect has been designed for Year 6 students and will use decision-making, transition to secondary school and time travel as its central themes, focusing particularly on those schools with a high proportion of children eligible for free school meals. It will be launched this autumn and for more information visit: http://www.tallstories.org.uk/small-stories-future-perfect

Tall Stories are committed to championing the importance of children's theatre and hope that these initiatives will inspire schools and families to make theatre and live performance more of a priority.

The Gruffalo Live extends until January 2017! The show returns to the West End in July to celebrate its 15th anniversary running from 6 July 2016 through to 8 January 2017. It will be staged at The Lyric Theatre, Shaftesbury Avenue, forming a huge part of this year's West End calendar.

Free tickets will be available for two teachers per London primary school to visit weekday shows of The Gruffalo Live from 6 July 2016 to 4 September 2016 subject to availability.

300 free tickets are available for 10 primary school classes of up to 30 students to visit performances of The Gruffalo Live from 6 July - 15 July. A limited number of tickets will also be made available this winter term to schools that are eligible, but are unable to attend in July 2016. Schools with the higher percentage of free school meals will be prioritised and allocation will be on a first come first served basis, subject to availability.

The Gruffalo Live is produced and created by the award-winning theatre company Tall Stories - a creative force whose credits include Room on the Broom, The Gruffalo's Child, The Snail and the Whale and The Snow Dragon. The creative team includes Director Olivia Jacobs, Creative Producer Toby Mitchell, Designer Isla Shaw, Composers Jon Fiber & Andy Shaw of JollyGoodTunes and Lighting Designer James Whiteside.

Photo Credit: Adam Bennett

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