Rab Fulton’s ghoulishly funny take on Little Red Riding Hood
By Charlie Mcbride
LITTLE RED Riding Hood, a sweet little girl or blood thirsty mass murderer? Wolfie, a monstrous beast or sensitive canine dude who eats grannies?
All will be revealed in Rab Fulton’s darkly comic exposé of Little Red Riding Hood – entitled The Bloody Tale of Little Red and Wolfie - which comes to the Town Hall next week.
Fulton, a Glaswegian who has been living in Galway for the past 10 years, is an accomplished storyteller, novelist, essayist, and poet. He specialises in folktales, myths, and urban legends from Ireland and Scotland, including tales handed down through his family.
In 2007 he won a Deis Award from the Arts Council of Ireland and in 2005 he won the Athenry Prize for his non-fiction essay Rome’s Gift of Freedom to the East – Propaganda Versus Reality.
The Bloody Tale of Little Red and Wolfie – which Rab will perform along with Fionnuala Gallagher - marks a new departure for him in that it’s his first play.
“Little Red is totally different to everything I have done before, “ he reveals over a Sunday afternoon phone call. “My upbringing had a lot storytelling which became my pastime as I got older and then my career. I often do storytelling work with adults, but here I decided I would like to do something from a child’s perspective and that emerged as the play Little Red and Wolfie.
“I didn’t realise writing a play would be such hard work, but it’s great. I’ve been trying out bits of it in front of audiences and the reaction so far has been very good.”
What prompted Rab to adapt Little Red Riding Hood? “It’s the story isn’t it!” he asserts. “I teach storytelling and I like to use that as a template. So it was an obvious one to want to adapt.
“In my version the wolf eats the granny but Red Riding Hood is happy because she doesn’t like her granny, and she then falls in love with Wolfie. The play is about what happens next; they go on a killing spree. It’s scary and funny, like a dark mix of Wanderly Wagon and Natural Born Killers.”
The Bloody Tale of Little Red and Wolfie is at the Town Hall on Friday November 6 and Saturday 7 and again on Saturday 14 at 12 noon, 2pm, and 4pm. It will also be staged as a free show in the Galway City Museum on Saturday.
Tickets are €7 from the Town Hall on 091 - 569777.
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