CAN you help make a garden grow for a leading Dorset theatre company?

Members of Angel Exit, who are based near Dorchester, are currently working on their next production, an adaptation of Frances Hodgson Burnett’s The Secret Garden, which they will tour early next year.

They are staging the show in conjunction with Dorchester and Bridport arts centres and are putting together a horticultural exhibition to go with the play.

To this end, they are asking people to take pictures of anything in their gardens that they think is worthwhile, and send them off to the company to join the display.

Angel Exit artistic director Tamsin Fessey said: “We would like pictures of people in their gardens, either holding or showing something they have grown, like fruit and vegetables, or with flowers or whatever.

“The idea is that our set designer will work with local students to put together an exhibition of pictures in secret drawers or hidden behind ivy, so when people come to see it they have to look for the items.”

The exhibition will be on show at Dorchester Corn Exchange and arts centre and also Bridport Arts Centre.

Angel Exit are currently putting together The Secret Garden and working with writer Phil Porter. Following the success of their last show, Moonfleet, the play is their biggest to date and after touring Dorset will head off to Leeds, Buxton Opera House, Chipping Norton and other venues.

The Secret Garden is a classic children’s story which sees spoilt Mary Lennox plucked from the bright vibrancy of India and transplanted to a big old house full of secrets on the grey Yorkshire moors.

As Mary battles loneliness she encounters locked doors, a curious robin, hidden keys, and strange cries ringing down the corridor. What happens next will transform her life.

Tamsin said: “We are currently at the research and development stage of the production, just working out how we will tell the tale.

“It is the biggest show we have done so far, in the fact that we are working with more people and have a lighting designer this time and puppetry made by Polly Beeston, who lives in London.

“Our venues range from village halls to large places like the Opera House and the set is designed to expand or concertina into the space.”

The Secret Garden goes on tour in January, 2012. When it is staged in Dorchester’s Corn Exchange, the show will include a prologue by members of the town’s youth theatre.

Further details of the tour will appear in the Dorset Echo nearer the time and anyone interested in submitted photographs to the exhibition can either email jpegs to info@angelexit.co.uk or drop them into Dorchester and Bridport arts centres.