A rabbit in a waistcoat. A disappearing cat. A very angry Queen. Tea parties with questionable logic. A world where growing, shrinking and falling down holes are all perfectly reasonable ways to spend an afternoon.
Now imagine adding aerialists.
This Christmas, Cirque Alice is doing exactly that.
Following sell out seasons in Australia and Singapore, the new production from creators Simon Painter and Tim Lawson will make its European premiere at London’s Royal Festival Hall, running from December 12, 2026 to January 3, 2027.
And Wonderland is about to get considerably more spectacular.
Cirque Alice isn’t a traditional stage adaptation of Lewis Carroll’s story.
Instead, the production takes the eccentric characters and surreal world of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and uses them as the starting point for an entirely new circus experience.
Across a two-hour show for all ages, the audience is invited to follow Alice down the rabbit hole into a Wonderland populated by extraordinary international performers.
Creative producer Simon Painter describes Carroll’s stories as the perfect backdrop for creating a magical circus narrative, particularly because of their collection of eccentric, larger-than-life characters.
And when you think about it, Wonderland already operates according to circus logic.
Nothing needs to make complete sense.
Impossible things happen.
Gravity is negotiable.
Sounds about right.
The performance brings together aerialists, acrobats and contortionists, alongside puppetry and special guest musical acts.
A newly arranged soundtrack of remixed classical favourites accompanies the action, creating a musical world around the performers rather than simply retelling the familiar story beat by beat.
The production’s creative team is led by creative directors Ash Jacks McCready and Kirsty Painter, with choreography by Dane Bates, costumes by Angela Aaron, lighting by Hugo Mercier, and musical arrangements from Martin Raabe-Olsen and Marius Christiansen.
The result promises a Wonderland that feels built for live performance: strange, physical, theatrical and larger than life.
Look Up
Possibly the most exciting part?
Some of the action isn’t going to stay on the stage.
On-stage seating places audience members at the heart of the performance, while artists soar above the Royal Festival Hall stage.
That proximity changes the feeling entirely.
You’re not simply watching someone enter Wonderland from a comfortable distance.
You’re sitting inside the spectacle.
And when aerialists are involved, it might be worth remembering to occasionally look up.
Christmas in Wonderland
London isn’t exactly short of family entertainment at Christmas.
But there is something particularly fitting about Wonderland arriving during the festive season.
Cirque Alice isn’t positioning itself exclusively as a children’s production, either. Executive producer Tim Lawson describes it as entertainment for all ages, whether audiences arrive for a family outing or a date night.
That’s an important distinction.
The best family shows don’t require adults to spend two hours politely waiting for their children to enjoy themselves.
The scale of the circus acts, theatrical design, music and visual spectacle gives this one the potential to work across generations while Carroll’s world already has more than enough weirdness to keep everyone interested.
From the Creators of Circus 1903
If the scale sounds ambitious, the team behind it has considerable experience in making very large things happen on stage.
Creators Simon Painter and Tim Lawson have produced and presented shows in more than 450 cities across 45 countries.
Their previous productions together include Le Grand Cirque, Cirque Adrenaline, The Illusionists and Circus 1903.
The latter previously enjoyed two sell-out seasons at the Southbank Centre and featured life sized elephant puppets created by puppeteers from War Horse.
Their work has also travelled through Broadway, London, Las Vegas and beyond, while Painter later served as President and Chief Executive Producer at Cirque du Soleil.
In other words, turning Wonderland into a full scale circus is not exactly their first encounter with theatrical excess.
Perhaps that’s what makes this combination so satisfying.
Circus asks audiences to believe, for a moment, that bodies can do things they shouldn’t be able to do.
Wonderland asks us to believe almost everything else.
Both worlds thrive on surprise. Both play with scale and perspective. Both become more interesting when normal rules stop applying. And both retain that particular kind of magic that works especially well when you’re a child but doesn’t necessarily disappear when you become an adult.
Cirque Alice simply brings the two together.
SHARE:
