Shockheaded Peter

About the show

Shockheaded Peter is a 1998 musical using the popular German children's book Struwwelpeter (1845) by Heinrich Hoffmann as its basis. Created by Julian Bleach, Anthony Cairns, Julian Crouch, Graeme Gilmour, Tamzin Griffin, Jo Pocock, Phelim McDermott, Michael Morris and The Tiger Lillies (Martyn Jacques, Adrian Huge and Adrian Stout) the production combines elements of pantomime and puppetry with musical versions of the poems with the songs generally following the text but with a somewhat darker tone. Whereas the children in the poems only sometimes die, in the musical they all do. Commissioned by the West Yorkshire Playhouse in Leeds and the Lyric Hammersmith in West London, the show debuted in 1998 in Leeds before moving to London and subsequently to world tours. While the Tiger Lillies performed as onstage band for the majority of the original Leeds and London runs, they were later replaced by David Thomas & Two Pale Boys.