You don’t need to suspend your imagination much to be convinced by Dinosaur Zoo Live, as Andrew Youngson finds out.
The only time that Lindsey Chaplin truanted from high school was when she skipped class to see Jurassic Park in the cinema.
The Sydney born and raised performer had already seen the Spielberg movie twice, but such was her love of all things dinosaur that running the risk of detention was worth it to see the film once more. As it happens, it was an act of disobedience which would lead her to a career as a real-life dinosaur zoo-keeper.
As the front lady for the Aussie-spawned Dinosaur Zoo Live experience, Lindsey is the human face of the show which brings wide-eyed kids into direct contact with life-size dinosaur puppets.
“Essentially, I’m the main presenter of the show – the Bindi Irwin-David Attenborough cross who introduces everyone to the dinosaurs and gets them up on stage to interact with them,” the 33-year-old explained enthusiastically.
“It’s not your regular theatre show in that it doesn’t have a storyline, goodies and baddies. It’s kind of a wildlife presentation. We teach the kids about these dinosaurs and there are elements about animal husbandry which would apply in real life. So we teach them how to meet the animals and we show them how they move around. And it just so happens that they are life-size dinosaur puppets, instead of dogs, cats and horses.”
During the course of the hour-long show, audience members from the age of three upwards are introduced to five types of dinos – each operated by world-class puppeteers. First up there’s the adorable Dryosauruses, followed by the giant dragonfly-like Meganeura, then the fleet-footed Leaellynasaura. And lastly, there’s the terrifying carnivore, the Australovenator, followed by the Titanosaur – a sauropod which is as gigantic as it sounds.
Don’t worry if you haven’t heard of these dinosaurs, though. There’s a reason for that.
“These are all Australian and New Zealand dinosaurs, which we’re really clear about. Because that’s what our show is – it’s Antipodean dinosaurs. Everyone knows about the Triceratops and T-Rex but actually every continent had its own types of dinosaurs.”
Since she joined the production in 2011 in its native Oz, Lindsey has marvelled at the universal appeal of dinosaurs, no matter which country they have taken the show to.
“I think that dinosaurs appeal to everyone. I remember as a kid when I first found out about them they seemed so unreal. But the fact is they did exist and that appeals to the child in all of us,” she said.
“The funny thing about our show is, in the first five minutes I say outright ‘these are puppets, they are not real, dinosaurs are extinct’. And then 30 seconds later we bring the first dinosaurs on stage and people immediately forget that I said they are puppets and the show has begun. It’s immediate – that real desire to jump out of our real lives and into a world where anything can come out from round the corner.”
So how do people watching the show react to seeing dinosaurs roaming the Earth once more?
“In my experience, it all depends on the individual. We have three-year-olds who happily waddle up on stage and meet out biggest carnivore without any fear whatsoever. And then we can completely freak out an 18-year-old boy on the street when we take our dinosaurs for a walk. So it entirely depends on the person and how far they’re willing to take their imaginations.”
In fact, it’s that moment when the audience first come into contact with the extinct thunder lizards that Lindsey loves the most.
“It’s that playful danger element. It’s when the children stick their hands up, I choose one of them and it’s that first step they take on to the stage. I’m always watching their eyes to see which way this is going to go. Because you can have the most enthusiastic child saying ‘me, me, me’, but once they’re within reaching distance it can go either way to fun, fear or joy.”
Rest assured, if kids in the “Danger Zone” front-row seats end up being less than keen with sharing the space with prehistoric predators, Lindsey and her fellow three puppeteers are expertly adept at calming people down. While she may have grown up in a country which abounds with venomous insects and ravenous beasts, she understands that their friends in the north might not be so enamoured.
“Well it does sometimes happen, and I find in Scotland it happens quite a lot, which I’m quite surprised at. But maybe it’s because you don’t have many natural predators up there,” she said. “If it does happen, I can talk them down, remind them it’s a puppet, but more often than not I find it’s a good idea to usher them off stage and find someone else. We really don’t like to humiliate kids.”
Dinosaur Zoo Live will be at HM Theatre, Aberdeen, from Friday, September 26, to Monday September 29. Performance times are at 4.30pm tomorrow; 10.30am on Saturday; and 10.30am and 4.30pm on Monday. Both regular and Danger Zone tickets are available from www.aberdeen performingarts.com or by calling 01224 641122.