The same trio that plays Te Haerenga: a journey of identity at night is bringing their story-telling skills to children 7 years and over, and “the extremely fearless.”

While we are waiting for the show to start a small boy in the second row accuses his mother, five rows back, of being too scared to sit down there with him. Like all the others he is full of anticipation for the experience promised by a stage dressed with spookily-lit masks and animal bones.

Each storyteller presents their ‘saga’ in turn, offering a brief ‘overture’ to set the tone of their tale then introducing themselves and their story in natural mode before launching into it, with well-integrated characterisations and vocalised sound-effects, abetted by appropriate lighting effects.

Cautioning kids who complain about their mums to be grateful she’s not like this one, Moira Wairama delivers an ancient korero from Ngati Porou. Houmea, the wife of fisherman Uta, mother of Tutawake and Nini, is a voracious consumer (you will have to go, to find out of what). Especially impressive is Moira’s manifestation of Houmea’s ‘gorgantuan’ appetite.

Ralph Johnson has chosen a story from France and delights in bringing a beautiful countess, her doting husband and various members of their household to life – and, in one case, death. A leg, badly broken and graphically amputated – we get to choose how – then replaced with a golden one, becomes the focus of attention. A clear moral that theft doesn’t pay is tainted with a whiff of how wrong it is for a valet to get ideas above his station.  

Hailing from a west coast tribe of native American Indians is Tony Hopkins’ monstrous creature: Dashkaya – related, I’m told to the Big-Foot / Sasquatch / Yeti legends – who sports greasy long hair, dribbles snot from her nose (“Mmmm, what a nice appetiser!”) and looks for children to suck out their brains. Fortunately for the little Indian girl who has heard this tale and has the inevitable encounter, the antidote proves to be to call on the protection of her ancestors – just as her mother told her. But … There is always a ‘but’ to keep us on our toes.

Having found it sad that the baddies are not scary enough in pantomimes these days, I’m delighted to observe the children attending the opening show of Scary Sagas lap it up. Confronting the fearsome in fantasy and fable is a crucial part of our early lives.
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