Mad as a Hatter...

Almost a century and a half ago an English writer by the name of Lewis Carroll penned a story of unprecedented nonsense about a girl who fell down a rabbit-role. In 1951 a bloke named Walt made a film about it. In 2008 another bloke has decided to make another, however this time substituted a rabbit-hole for a hackney cab, the girl for a Hollywood A-Lister from Orange County, and somehow ended up in Sunderland.

The idea of rhyming rabbits in reading glasses and red waistcoats probably doesn’t fall in the ‘PC’ bracket of this day and age and many would speculate the contemporary changes from a psychedelic wonderland to the bright lights of Sunderland are necessary.

If you haven’t cottoned on to what I’m talking about yet, Alice in Wonderland is set to hit the big screens once more, ineptly renamed Malice in Wonderland. The remake of Carroll’s estranged writings will star Hollywood Actress Mischa Barton as a US student who is hit by a London taxi later finding herself in odd new surroundings.




Those odd new surroundings were in fact Sunderland, until a few weeks back when film soirees at Future films pulled the plug and re-located to Southend.

The reasons due to Sunderland bosses wanting to spend the money on weaning local talent instead.
However film bosses said:

“The title was also changed as everyone in the UK would know Sunderland but outside UK they wouldn't. I also thought two puns in one title were one too many."

Figures. But surely was it not that Sunderland was chosen merely for its similarity in pronunciations and the screenwriter’s exceptional ability to play on words?

Not entirely. Although born in Cheshire, Lewis Carroll grew up in nearby Darlington, penning the just as eccentric poem the “Jabberwocky” while staying with relatives in Sunderland. The mythological creature for which the poem retorts is said to be based upon Sunderland folk legend the Lambton Worm, and is featured in Alice’s adventures in Wonderland.

So as Sunderland loses out, another blockbuster is set for the lower regions, as Southend - just a stones throw away from the capital, embarks on a malice adventure.