I remember Wednesday 12 April 1961 very well.

The kids in my class (and me, of course) had a great teacher and we were allowed, occasionally, to listen to special broadcasts on the radio. On that day Yuri Alekseyevich Gagarin became the first person to journey into outer space. Travelling on Vostok 1, Gagarin completed one orbit of Earth with his flight taking 108 minutes. By achieving this major milestone for the Soviet Union, Gagarin became an international celebrity and was awarded many medals and titles, including his country’s highest distinction: Hero of the Soviet Union. 

The excitement in class was palpable.

I was sixteen years old.

Valentina Vladimirovna Tereshkova is a Russian engineer, a member of the State Duma, and former Soviet cosmonaut. She was the first woman in space, having flown a solo mission on Vostok 6 on 16 June 1963. She orbited the Earth 48 times, spent almost three days in space, is the only woman to have been on a solo space mission, and is the last surviving Vostok programme cosmonaut. Twenty-six years old at the time of her spaceflight, she remains the youngest woman to have flown in space under the international definition of 100 km altitude, and the youngest woman to fly in Earth orbit. Tereshkova is still with us, age eighty-eight.

I was eighteen and a second-year student at teachers training college at that time.

Neil Alden Armstrong was an American astronaut and aeronautical engineer who, as the commander of the 1969 Apollo 11 mission, became the first person to walk on the Moon. He was also a naval aviator, test pilot, and university professor. He saw action in the Korean War. After the war, he completed his bachelor’s degree at Purdue and became a test pilot. He made his first spaceflight as command pilot of Gemini 8 in March 1966, becoming NASA’s first civilian astronaut to fly in space. On July 20, 1969, Armstrong and Apollo Lunar Module 11 pilot Buzz Aldrin became the first people to land on the moon, and the next day they spent two and a half hours outside the Lunar Module Eagle spacecraft while Michael Collins remained in lunar orbit in the Apollo Command Module Columbia. When Armstrong first stepped onto the lunar surface, he famously said: ‘That’s one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind.’

In 1969, I was twenty-four, married, and teaching at an intermediate school in Ōtautahi Christchurch.

Laika was a Soviet space dog who was one of the first animals in space and the first to orbit the Earth. A stray mongrel from the streets of Moscow, she flew aboard the Sputnik 2 spacecraft, launched into low orbit on 3 November 1957. As the technology to re-enter the atmosphere had not yet been developed, Laika’s survival was never expected. She died of hyperthermia hours into the flight, on the craft’s fourth orbit.

I was twelve and really upset that Laika had been sacrificed like that.

So why is any of this relevant to a theatre review?

Simple, these four real people – I’ll promote Laika to human status for the purpose of this review – are also the primary characters we meet in The Valentina, an absolutely delightful recycled production written and directed by Anders Falstie-Jensen for The Rebel Alliance and which can be consumed as part of Auckland Live’s ‘We the Young’ Festival to be staged at the Aotea Centre in the CBD of Tāmaki Makaurau from 16 to 28 September 2025.

Consumed?

Is that what we do with art?

It’s not a word I would commonly use but The Valentina is not your usual festival show. It’s different because, in this instance, for $15, you can experience the show in your own home by buying a link and showing it, at your leisure, to your whānau, in a venue of your choice. In my experience, this is a unique concept but that, in itself, should be no surprise because The Rebel Alliance has been at the cutting edge of new theatre work since Falstie-Jensen established the company in 2006. To date, The Rebel Alliance has created and staged ten plays, seven of which have been premieres of new New Zealand works.

Falstie-Jensen hails from the plains of Jutland, Denmark and a selection of his kiwi output includes, as playwright, The Rehearsal, The Bomb, Standstill, Centrepoint, Back to Square One? and as a director The Orderly, A Night of French Mayhem, The Bomb, Standstill, Back to Square One? and The Valentina (2022 Winner of Plays for the Young – 8 to12-year-old category).

The Rebel Alliance has adapted that acclaimed live performance family production, The Valentina, into an illustrated audiobook and it’s well worth the money. This adaptation is available online as part of ‘We the Young,’ a new Auckland Live arts festival dedicated to celebrating young people and their families.

The Valentina is the wild story of 8-year-old Ellen, who, with the help of her awesome parents, paints a star scape and spaceship on her bedroom ceiling. As darkness falls and the moon rises, the ship comes to life. Joining Ellen on board are four new friends and trusted crew members Yuri Gagarin, Neil Armstong, Laika the space dog, and the first woman in space, Valentina Tereshkova.

This distinctive adaptation of the original stage production showcases over 100 original illustrations by renowned theatre set designer John Verryt, marking his debut as a children’s book illustrator. It also features an impressive soundscape composed by Sean Lynch and includes voice performances by the original cast members: Ross McCormack, Bronwyn Turei, Wesley Dowdell, Talia Pua, and Kevin Keys.

The story begins with an average family getting their day underway – standard stuff really (it doesn’t stay that way): eight-year-old Ellen doesn’t want to go to school, we learn interesting facts about Mum who lost her hand in a shark attack in the waters off the coast of Capetown, about Dad who works at the zoo, lost his eye in an accident with a kiwi, and has since volunteered to work with the big cats one of whom – Hector – gets very hangry.

Ellen is eventually convinced that going to school is the best option and there follows a magical scene in the car with Dad and Ellen heading off to school. It’s quirky and introduces us to a family happy in their eccentricity. We also experience the gentle wit and droll satire of Falstie-Jensen’s delicate script for the first time.

There are touches of parody, and the style of the humour is delicious. It walks a delicate line between age-appropriate comedy that is suitable for both children and delightful for adults. There’s a ‘Dad’ comment about the calming effect of Radio New Zealand and we are encouraged to appreciate this via a calming burst of Edvard Grieg’s ‘Peer Gynt’.

A most welcome interlude.

Suddenly, we find ourselves in a field in rural Russia with a little girl and her potato growing mother. A parachute descends and Yuri Gagarin joins the farmer and her daughter. He introduces himself as ‘a Soviet just like you’ and, after some beautifully accented chat, Mum and Yuri go off to get a cup of tea. There is a wonderful thread throughout the show highlighting the place that cups of tea and even stronger cups of coffee have always had in our society. 

I also like these brief but well-controlled segues.

(A short pause now for a sip of Joe)

Without warning, we find ourselves in ‘golden time’ in maths class and Ellen is ‘away with the pixies’. Called to account by her teacher, Ellen proves herself equal to the most difficult of sums which is good for us to know considering what is to come.

(It’s always good in a family show, to have a kid score a victory over a grumpy teacher).

After school, Ellen arrives home and shows her parents a beautiful drawing of a spaceship, the one she created during maths that got her into trouble. Her parents wax lyrical about the spaceship – and its technical accuracy – and the result is her parents, led by her talented Mum, paint a star scape on Ellen’s ceiling with Ellen’s spaceship taking centre spot.

As she drifts off to sleep, the star scape comes to life and Ellen is joined in her spaceship by Valentina Tereshkova, Yuri Gagarin, Neil Armstrong and Laika the dog and they depart on a mission. Check the start of the review for biographical information about these characters – a good teaching moment, perhaps.

The new friends land (with a bit of a bump) on an unknown planet where they meet up with a very nasty monster, nasty, but not totally scary, and what follows is a delicious adventure story played out all the way through to a magical ending.

No spoilers, sorry.

The Valentina is engaging throughout, enthralling in fact, and the practitioner in me was hugely impressed by the quality of the voice over work and the storytelling. A major feature of any audiobook is the quality of the audio – I well remember being blown away years back by Jeremy Irons reading Vladimir Nabokov’s Lolita – in conjunction with the quality of any visuals that accompany the narrative. Audio for The Valentina is coordinated by the inimitable Sean Lynch who seems to be aboard with almost everything I see (and hear) just at the moment.

No surprise, as his work is always remarkable.

John Verryt’s illustrations are exquisite: elegant, simple, personalized, and they tell the story magnificently. I have included some in this review for your pleasure. Photographs of the images are by John Rata, and they’re quite magnificent too. 

Audiobooks also rise, or fall, on the quality of the voice actors and Falstie-Jensen has sensibly re-gathered his original cast and they are quite superb. The art of voiceover recording appears to be so very simple but it’s really not, even though this group make it seem so. Under the careful (smart and loving) guidance of Falstie-Jensen and Lynch, the entire production is recorded at Parachute Music Studios in Kingsland. Auckland and the whole team should be enormously happy with the results.

Bravo!

The Valentina is exquisite, and I thoroughly recommend it to you. Having an audiobook as part of a live performance festival is unique and it works an absolute treat.

Expect more.

The Rebel Alliance, Auckland Live, and the ‘We the Young’ Festival are to be roundly congratulated on their creativity with a special shout out to Auckland Live for having the smarts to create a festival exclusively for the very young. To access the hotlink to The Valentina, go to the Auckland Live website and click on The Valentina | Auckland Live. It’s an outstanding show that you can have in your own home, your lounge, or in your playroom for a mere $15. Even though the festival doesn’t kick off for a few days yet, you can access the link already.

Buy it, you won’t regret it.

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