A Christmas spectacular
The Thursford Christmas Spectacular brings West End performers to rural Norfolk
Tapping into festive family activities can be a lucrative option for landowners seeking to diversify their businesses. Lee Murphy speaks to CLA member John Cushing OBE who runs the largest Christmas show in the country.
The Thursford Christmas Spectacular near Fakenham in Norfolk has attracted nearly 6 million visitors since 1977. Coach loads of visitors travel from across the country to watch a show that would not be out of place in London’s West End. Indeed, many of the performers are well versed in treading the boards at some of London’s largest productions.
John took over the running of Thursford from his father in 1977 and over time has completely transformed the whole site – which was once home to a range of cattle sheds and other redundant agricultural buildings.
At the time, his father had an impressive collection of steam engines and organs and people could visit in return for a small voluntary donation. Seeing the potential of the collection, John transformed the barn that housed the engines into a museum and major tourist attraction.
In his first year, John also put on a carol concert for around 500 people in the run up to Christmas. The following year, Norfolk school choirs were invited to perform. “When we started, they were all amateurs, the performances then went from one, to four, to eight, to fifteen. Some choirs then couldn’t commit to the number of shows required, therefore I started using professional choirs,” says John.
“It’s progressed from there. Every year we have improved and invested more money and the popularity of the show has grown organically by word of mouth over time, particularly among coach operators.”
The Christmas Spectacular now has a cast of around 150 people and while John selects the music for the show, he employs casting and choreography directors to hold auditions in London for the singers and dancers. A musical director then holds in the region of 40 instrumental auditions.
This year more than 2000 singers and 1000 dancers applied. “Because we are now well known in showbusiness we get a very professional turnout of people wanting to work here,” comments John.
Along with the show at Thursford, there is a Santa’s Magical Journey experience and an Enchanted Journey of Light show. “Our Christmas businesses are now attracting around 160,000 people and we plan for this across the whole year.” says John.
But attracting this volume of visitors over an eight-week time frame does come with its challenges. “The biggest challenge is that we have so many people coming on site so rapidly,” says John. “We have to take on nearly 300 front of house people each year and train these new staff members in a short period of time.
“Then we have around 150 cast members on site, a vast production team, a wardrobe team for all the costumes and further teams undertaking a wide range of roles behind the scenes.”
Specialist performers at the show this year include a Ukrainian contortion act, an Italian circus performer and a European mountain bike champion. Organising the Christmas Spectacular is a massive undertaking which John and the team work on tirelessly throughout the year.