A Wild Audience With...

A Wild Audience With...
Doug Allan, Steve Backshall, Lucy Cooke, Martin Hughes-Games
and, your host, Steve Leonard

LYRIC THEATRE, Shaftesbury Avenue, London
Monday 8th & Monday 15th December 2014 at 7.30pm

Join five of the UK's top television wildlife presenters for a fascinating evening of wild stories and thrilling insights into their greatest encounters with the natural world.

Not everyone wants to go to the pantomime at Christmas ... Londoners who are feeling the weight of urban life can re-wild themselves this festive season in the comfort of one of Shaftesbury Avenue's finest theatres! Five television natural history experts will share some of their life-changing wildlife experiences. From an obsession with the humble sloth to being stalked by an angry polar bear. From the thrill of trekking tigers to deadly encounters with the world's fiercest ocean predator, the great white shark. Punctuated with thrilling footage, A Wild Audience with ... will be full of fascinating, passionate and funny stories from:
• Steve Backshall - a BAFTA winning adventurer and author whose zeal for wildlife has influenced a new generation of ardent conservationists and natural history enthusiasts through his phenomenally successful series Deadly 60. Yet it remains a mystery as to whether or not he can do the Rumba!
• Zoologist Martin Hughes-Games has produced some of the most spectacular wildlife documentaries during the past 30 years and now presents Springwatch and Autumnwatch. He is passionate about wildlife and is an active conservationist.
• Doug Allan is a BAFTA and EMMY award-winning cameraman whose cinematography has been seen on many of the greatest wildlife programmes of all time. David Attenborough describes him as “the toughest in the business".
• Lucy Cooke is a National Geographic explorer, award-winning natural history documentary producer and presenter, best-selling author and the proud founder of the Sloth Appreciation Society.
• Veterinary Surgeon Steve Leonard has presented wildlife series for the past 15 years (Vets in Practice and Operation Wild) and has operated on some of the most endangered animals in the world.

Audiences will be invited to put the experts on the spot by asking them questions and testing their knowledge throughout the show. Although the show is very family friendly it is best suited for children aged 8 and over.

Audience reviews:
Insightful, educational, inspirational wild life show/superb presenters and their favourite clips that kept is glued to our seats even during the interval eagerly waiting for the second half. Audience mixed with many children and it is their questions to the presenters that made this evening so special, memorable and rewarding too. Professionally organised event at every stage and level - even included charity collection and books/cards sales form respective TV series being sold at the end. If you missed this one please go for the 15th December as it is unmissable! Life through the lens brought us so much joy, and mesmerising moments of laughter too and a joy of living on this ever so challenging planet. Well done! Thank you! 5 stars

· It was a pleasure to hear the experiences of some of TVs top wildlife presenters from themselves; I found Doug Allan and Steve Backshall particularly inspiring. The film footage shown was excellent and despite there being some very young children in the audience the presenters held everyone's attention. It was really worth going to. We, the audience, also had the opportunity to ask questions. This worked best the first time round with the Qs put to Doug Allan, thereafter Steve Leonard took up some of the Q&A time with his own interjections which meant there was less time for Qs to be put to the main presenters. Great sight lines in this theatre, nice box office staff and ushers. Thank you AC for a lovely Monday evening! 4 stars

· Yeah pretty good, it was a nice show with very enthusiastic speakers and lots of interesting stories.. Lots of kids were there and they all seemed to really enjoy it too. 4 stars

· Enjoyable, entertaining and interesting performances by the wildlife team through their talks and accompanying slides/films with an insight into the perils of wildlife presenting and "behind the lens" anecdotes from the photographer, Doug Allan. There were far more questions wanting to be asked than the given time allowed for Q & A sessions due to time restrictions but the presenters rightly tried to accommodate as many as possible from the enthusiastic younger members of the audience before the lion roared and they had to stop. 4 stars

· Enjoyable and interesting stories from this charismatic wildlife team. Great for adults and children alike. Doug Allen is an amazing cameraman and thoroughly enjoyed his snippets. Lots of banter as team worked very well together. This was the first experimental evening and would recommend going to their next performance next week if you can. 4 stars