The Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection or the survival of [r]evolutionary theories in the face of scientific and ecclesiastical objections: being a musical comedy about Charles Darwin (1809 - 1882)

Darwin meets Willie Nelson in the posters for this comedy musical, so it's a surprise to enter the old-school study of a polite and smartly-dressed young man who introduces himself as Charles.

Writer/performer John Hinton plays Darwin as a wide-eyed barnacle obsessive, who uses the somewhat limited skills he learned at private school to strum his way with unbridled enthusiasm through both his autobiography and the ideas contained in his most recent snappily-titled book.

This utterly charming show is already packing them into Pleasance Beside, which is just as well as the audience are required to participate in a range of inspired activities including a mass demonstration of the diversity of finches.
There’s somehow also time to pause for a spot of juggling.

This is a structurally ambitious show packed tightly with cerebral gags and gen(i)us rhymes. Audiences who know their phenotypes from their genotypes will appreciate every in-joke, but those who don’t will still be thoroughly entertained by this glorious tribute to the man who defied the church, the scientific community and, most bravely of all, his father’s furious frown to change the way we view ourselves (and barnacles) forever.