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World Book Day: The Best Theatre Shows Based on Books

Posted on Thursday 7th March 2024 at 16:00

Jimi Arundell

Written by
Jimi Arundell

World Book Day The Best Theatre Shows Based on Books

World Book Day celebrates the joy of reading, reminding everyone of the importance of books and literacy. As families dress up as their favourite fictional characters or costumes informed by brilliant books, Gigantic Tickets joins in the fun by bringing you an exciting range of theatre shows inspired by books and great writers! 

Gigantic offers you a wide range of exciting experiences, including family-friendly events, music concerts and festivals. Click the link below to start your adventure and choose from an ever-growing range of thrilling shows and live entertainment.  

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Matilda The Musical 

Even if you're little you can do a lot

Matilda The Musical

Roald Dahl’s Matilda The Musical was first staged in 2010 and has since received widespread critical acclaim and multiple trophies, including over 100 international awards.   

Gifted with amazing telekinetic powers, extraordinary girl Matilda Wormwood is determined to break free from the many setbacks caused by her uncaring family and cruel school to find herself a new life. With original songs written by comedian Tim Minchin, Matilda The Musical celebrates the anarchy of childhood and the multi-award-winning show can be seen at the Cambridge Theatre. 

Beloved children’s writer Roald Dahl also penned such great works as The Twits, The Witches, Fantastic Mr Fox, The BFG, James and the Giant Peach, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, George's Marvellous Medicine and Danny, the Champion of the World. His cherished bedtime stories side with the underdog with a generous spirit which have touched the hearts of readers around the world for generations. 

 

📆 Event Dates:  

CLICK HERE for the full listings. 

Get your Matilda The Musical tickets with Gigantic today! 

 

Les Miserables 

The timeless tale of justice, redemption, and revolution  

Les Miserables Gigantic Tickets

Victor Hugo’s masterpiece novel Les Miserables was first adapted for the stage in London during 1985 and has played to packed out audiences ever since. Many consider it to be the ultimate West End show which is currently running at Sondheim Theatre. 

Les Miserables centres on the tragic character Jean Valjean, a French peasant who has served nineteen years in jail for stealing a loaf of bread to feed his starving niece. Determined to start a new life, intransigent police inspector Javert continues to hound our hero after he breaks his bail conditions. The story also reveals the terrible blight of poverty as idealistic revolutionaries seek to overturn the unscrupulous government and bring about a new age of liberty, equality, and fraternity.    

19th-century French romantic writer Victor-Marie Hugo was a passionate champion of progress, demanding the abolition of aristocracy, capital punishment and slavery. In addition to Les Misérables, Hugo also wrote gothic-romantic classics The Hunchback of Notre-Dame and The Man Who Laughs. A national hero, more than two million mourners joined Hugo's funeral procession in Paris from the Arc de Triomphe to the Panthéon where he would be buried. 

 

📆 Event Dates: 

CLICK HERE for the full listings. 

Get your Les Miserables tickets with Gigantic today! 

 

Wicked  

See the spell-binding musical enjoyed by millions of fans at the Apollo Victoria Theatre 

Wicked Gigantic Tickets 

Winner of more than 100 global awards, Wicked is one of the most successful musicals of all time, thrilling audiences around the world. Set in the Land of Oz, it tells the magical tale of unlikely friends Galinda who is known later as Glinda the Good and Elphaba before she becomes the Wicked Witch of the West. The pair navigate political corruption together and are thrown into crisis over a shared romantic interest. 

Wicked is written by Winnie Holzman and features music by Stephen Schwartz. The show is a loose adaptation of Gregory Maguire’s book Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West which drew its inspiration from the fantastical L. Frank Baum novel The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. Baum’s melodrama was also the basis for the classic 1939 movie The Wizard of Oz starring the iconic Hollywood actress Judy Garland.  

 

📆 Event Dates: 

CLICK HERE for the full listings. 

Get your Wicked tickets with Gigantic today! 

 

Austentatious  

Experience the classic novels of Regency Era writer Jane Austen in a hilarious new way! 

Austentatious Gigantic Tickets

Austentatious is an improvised comedy show which transforms the novels of revered author Jane Austen into a side-splitting improvised comedy show. First heard on BBC Radio 4, Austentatious is now presented at the Arts Theatre in London following multiple sell-out runs at the Edinburgh Fringe. The all-star cast includes Rachel Parris (The Mash Report, Live at the Apollo), Cariad Lloyd (QI, Inside No.9), Joseph Morpurgo (Radio 4, Edinburgh Comedy Award nominee) and Andrew Hunter Murray (No Such Thing As A Fish). 

Jane Austen is regarded as one of the greatest ever British writers, breaking through the barriers placed on women in the 19th century. The romantic novelist combined social commentary with dramatic storytelling, creating compelling plots and emotionally complex characters. Her works include such seminal books as Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice, Mansfield Park, and Emma. 

 

📆 Event Dates: 

CLICK HERE for the full listings. 

Get your Austentatious tickets with Gigantic today! 

 

Minority Report  

Philip K. Dick’s thought-provoking tale as re-imagined by the award-winning director Max Webster 

Gigantic Tickets Minority Report

Set in 2050, Minority Report describes a dystopian future where crimes are punished before they even take place. Neuroscientist Dame Julia Anderton is part of the elite Pre-crime programme that captures criminals before they have even thought of breaking the law. But suddenly, she finds she is the one being pursued through the streets of London. 

Inspired by the novella The Minority Report by Philip K. Dick, the original text first featured in the science fiction magazine Fantastic Universe in 1956 explores ideas of justice and determinism. It was an early glimpse into the great work that was to come from the genius who wrote the Hugo Award-winning alternative history novel The Man in the High Castle.  

Dick would also write the short story Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? which served as the inspiration behind Ridley Scott’s visually stunning and philosophically compelling movie Bladerunner. His other stories Total Recall, A Scanner Darkly and Screamers have also been adapted for film. 

 

📆 Event Dates: 

CLICK HERE for the full listings. 

Get your Minority Report tickets with Gigantic today! 

 

The Tiger Who Came to Tea  

See the classic Judith Kerr picture book transformed into a stunning stage adaptation 

The Tiger Who Came to Tea Gigantic Tickets

Beloved picture book The Tiger Who Came to Tea is brought to life as an Olivier Award nominated smash hit stage show. Sophie and her mummy have escaped the rain and are settling down for tea when a charming yet insatiable tiger invites themselves in to join them. 

Author and illustrator Judith Kerr was born in Germany between the wars. She came and resettled in Britain with her family after fleeing Nazi persecution, which inspired her semi-autobiographical story When Hitler Stole Pink Rabbit. Kerr also created the Mog series of children’s books, following the life and everyday adventures of a cherished family cat. 

The Tiger Who Came to Tea is currently showing at Theatre Royal Haymarket, London. Click the link and book your tickets with Gigantic. 

 

📆 Event Dates: 

CLICK HERE for the full listings. 

Get your The Tiger Who Came to Tea tickets with Gigantic today! 

 

Jeff Wayne’s The War Of The Worlds – Alive On Stage!

The original horror story of alien invasion

Jeff Wayne’s The War Of The Worlds – Alive On Stage!

Jeff Wayne’s The War Of The Worlds brings to life H.G. Wells’ frightening story of alien invasion as a dramatic rock opera. The deadly Tripods are brought to life as 3D holograms towering over live actors fleeing from the Martian menace. Can humanity survive its greatest threat or are we doomed to extinction?

Victorian writer H.G. Wells is credited as the father of modern science fiction. The socialist author envisioned the potential of progress to usher us into a future era of utopia, whilst warning readers of the terrors that technology could inflict. His wild imagination predicted biological engineering, the invention of mechanised war machines and the advent of space travel. His ground-breaking novels The Time Machine, The Island of Doctor Moreau and When the Sleeper Wakes amongst other works saw him earn multiple nominations for the Nobel Prize in Literature.

 

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Get your Jeff Wayne’s The War Of The Worlds tickets with Gigantic today!

 

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