BBC Worldwide has developed a live stadium show for two- to five-year-olds, showcasing favourite children's TV characters.
CBeebies Live! will hit the road on December 17 for a seven-city tour. The BBC hopes it will become an annual Christmas fixture and the first of a number of stage adaptations of familiar BBC TV formats - with Doctor Who as one possibility.
The show is directed by Iain Lauchlan, who co-wrote it with Will Brenton. The pair, who co-founded Tell-Tale Productions, which makes The Tweenies, are also behind The Tweenies' live stadium show, which has been seen by more than 1.2 million people since it began touring four years ago.
"Our aim with The Tweenies was to take the TV show on the road out into the provinces. So we tried big arena spectaculars with rock gig sound and lighting rigs - and it's worked very well," Mr Lauchlan says.
"We believe arenas are the best venues for kids. Theatres may be smaller and more intimate, but this means there is less space for them to run about when they get restless. In a larger stadium, we limit numbers to no more than 4,500, extend the size of the stage, and position screens outside the auditorium for children to watch the show from an adjacent soft play area if they so choose."
But while this formula has worked for The Tweenies, it can be difficult for other children's properties to fill a stadium. So working with BBC Worldwide, Mr Lauchlan and Mr Brenton have set about developing an even larger scale production featuring a collection of characters - including Bob the Builder, Postman Pat, Fireman Sam, Andy Pandy, Bill and Ben and Pingu - in a single story about a lost letter.
The end result is a live show costing an estimated £1m to put together and £25,000-£30,000 a week to keep on the road.
Fully underwritten by BBC Worldwide, CBeebies Live! requires participating rights owners - the BBC, BEN Productions, Entertainment Rights, HIT and Novel Entertainment - to make available their characters and provide appropriate body suits and animatronic body parts, props and models, and a pre-recorded speech and musical soundtrack. In return, they take a share of royalties and enjoy a high-profile shop window during the all-important Christmas sales period.
"It's an opportunity we couldn't turn down," says Katie Foster, the European brand business director for HIT, whose characters include Bob the Builder, Fireman Sam and Pingu.
"We've done one live show with Bob, but the challenge when you're building a show around a single character is replicating what you see on TV. For Bob this required a vast array of large vehicles on stage which meant large venues and high costs."
Despite such concerns, HIT is developing a live Fireman Sam show for 2006. Meanwhile, Balamory Live - a stage adaptation of the popular BBC pre-school series - ended its second national tour in October.
"Live shows return substantial revenues back to the BBC," said Craig Stanley, the general manager, live events, at BBC Worldwide.
"Exploring other sides of familiar characters on stage deepens an audience's interaction with the characters, and enhances their overall enjoyment. Which is why I am absolutely confident of the potential of live stage adaptation for all sorts of audiences - not just kids."
BBC Worldwide has already staged two Fame Academy Live tours and, more recently, a Tomorrow's World roadshow.
"Now we are in development with a live dance show inspired by Strictly Come Dancing. And there is also the possibility of a Doctor Who live show at some point in the future," Mr Stanley said.
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