Chichester Festival Youth Theatre makes a triumphant return to the main theatre with a most wondrous production that exceeds their already high standard - a perfect Christmas treat.

Bryony Lavery’s new adaptation of Dodie Smith’s well loved novel provides a splendid springboard for the ever imaginative mind of director, Dale Rooks and her creative team, to bring to the stage this tale of dark skulduggery and dogged heroism. And yes – they even manage to get 101 singing and dancing dogs on stage. No mean feat of choreography.

A neat idea is to have costumes that are merely canine suggestive rather than doggy onesies - thereby providing visual variety and character definition.

The script is full of jokes, puns, alliteration and even rhyming couplets.

With a cast of 122 it is only possible to single out a few performances. Fred Davis and Romina Hytten bring to life the canine parents, Pongo and Missis whilst Beth Cave is most adorable as the abandoned Perdita. Equally impressive are India Loseby and Lucy Pratt who each gets to sing a duet with the villainous Cruella De Vil.

Poppy Crawford plays Cruella superbly, stealing the show with a strong performance that never quite goes over the top.