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Magic Hands Marks 400th Anniversary of Shakespeare’s Death with 5 Special Adaptations
Episodes based on The Tempest, Twelfth Night, As You Like It, A Midsummer Night’s Dream and Romeo Juliet To Air From Monday 25th April 2016
TX DATES- Cbeebies Channel @ 11.10am and 3.10pm
The Tempest – A Magical Storm: Monday 25th April
Twelfth Night – Identical Twins: Tuesday 26th April
As You Like It – All the World’s a Stage: Wednesday 27th April
A Midsummer Night’s Dream – Fabulous Fairies: Thursday 28th April
Romeo and Juliet – Fighting Families: Friday 29th April
This month, Ground-breaking children’s poetry series Magic Hands is celebrating the legacy of William Shakespeare with 5 special episodes to coincide with the 400th anniversary of the great bard’s death on April 23th 2016.
From Monday 25th April to Friday 29th April, tune in daily to the CBeebies channel at 3.10pm to watch the brand new special episodes of Magic Hands adaptations of The Tempest, Twelfth Night, As You Like It, A Midsummer Night’s Dream and Romeo and Juliet.
Inspired by the idea that young children can enjoy the rhythm and meaning of the older English even if they don’t quite understand the language, Magic Hands uses British Sign Language, animation, music and the spoken word to bring poetry and prose to the under six audience. The show is currently in its second series and alongside Shakespeare, introduces pre-schoolers to the works of literature’s greats including John Keats, William Wordsworth, Lewis Carrol and Robert Browning.
THE SHAKESPEARE EPISODES ARE:
The Tempest - A Magical Storm: Donna and Simon are sailing the squally seas in a medieval ship. In today’s story Leapy Lion and Pink Bird dress as Prospero and Miranda in the Tempest and show us what happens when meddling magical Prospero brews up some very stormy waves to cause a horrible shipwreck.
Twelfth Night - Identical Twins: Ashley and Aimee head to ancient Greece where there’s been a terrible shipwreck. Bobbles and Pink Bird dress up as identical twins, Sebastian and Viola who have lost each other at sea. Questing to find her twin Viola encounters noble men and women who are falling in love, before she’s finally reunited with Bobbles, her identical twin, because of a mole on her father’s forehead.
As You Like It - All The World's A Stage: Ashley and Aimee and the Creature Crew set up camp in the woods for today’s special re-telling of As You Like It. Bobbles plays a jester with rotten fruit on his clock and the whole team have fun dressing up as babies, soldiers, lovers and old men to find out why All the World’s a Stage.
A Midsummer Night's Dream - Fabulous Fairies: Aimee and Ashley head off to an enchanted forest to discover why Bobbles and Pink Bird, dressing up as King and Queen of the Fairies, have fallen out so badly. Here they meet some squabbling fairies, a playful elf and Leapy Lion dressed as a man with a donkey’s head!
Romeo and Juliet - Fighting Families: Donna and Simon follow the sweet smell of a rose and head to ancient Verona. Here they meet young sweethearts Romeo and Juliet, played with great gusto by Leapy Lion and Pink Bird. The two think the world of each other, but their fighting families have forbidden them to be friends.