I once had to prepare a class of American students for their very first pantomime. The more I talked, the more I lost confidence. I sounded preposterous. What could possibly be appealing about the eccentric mix of fairytale, music hall and folk tradition I was trying to enthuse them with?
As it happened, they loved it. Evidently, the joy of panto is beyond words. You just have to be there.
In these days of coronavirus lockdown, however, being there is no longer an option. Which is why going online to watch Ryan McBryde’s production of Cinderella (★★★☆☆) leaves me conflicted.
On the one hand, it’s a generous idea to share a show with housebound families for this Easter week – and a clever way to campaign for funds for the Mercury Theatre Colchester’s £9.8m redevelopment project.
On the other hand, watching such an exuberant and interactive form in the solitude of your living room makes you feel oddly detached. It isn’t us shouting out our names to Mari McGinlay’s self-assured Ella when she asks us to introduce ourselves. It isn’t us getting peed on by the Ugly Sisters’ dogs as they carry them around in their handbags. And it isn’t us joining in a competitive bout of Get Me to the Church on Time before the final curtain.
None of this is a massive loss, but it’s enough to take the edge off a classy production. Pantomime trades on controlled chaos, something that needs you in the same room as the unfolding anarchy. What must have seemed naughty, rambunctious and funny on stage too often feels tame on screen. As a result, the fairy-story romance between McGinlay’s no-nonsense heroine and Samuel Knight’s Prince Charming comes across best.
As pantos go, this Cinderella is at the posher end of the scale. Less the rough-and-ready vigour of the music hall (although Mercury regulars Antony Stuart-Hicks and Dale Superville provide grit as the Ugly Sisters), more the polish of legit actors lending psychological depth to Andrew Pollard’s script. That’s when they’re not being put through their musical-theatre paces on the free-range soundtrack put together by musical director Nick Barstow. In one medley alone they go from Meghan Trainor’s All About That Bass to Rosemary Clooney’s Sisters.
Ticking all the panto boxes, Pollard jazzes things up with a cross-dressing Dandini, going in disguise to improve her work prospects. It adds a touch of Twelfth Night playfulness, works in a spot of feminist commentary and gives an excellent Nerine Skinner the chance to exercise her comedic muscles. That’s in addition to providing an alternative love interest for Nicholas McLean’s Buttons. If we lose the poignancy of seeing him unlucky in love after Ella lands her prince, we gain in the pleasing symmetry of a double romance.
The production dates from December, in that fairytale era when we took public gathering for granted. Rapunzel: The Lockdown Panto (★★★★☆), by contrast, is every bit in the here and now. Created by Regal Entertainments and St Helens Theatre Royal, James Lacey’s delightful show turns social distancing into an asset.
Each cast member has recorded their part at home, so we get Abby Middleton’s spirited Fairy Anna(logue) guiding us through a story that splices together domestic interiors framed by cartoon palaces, towers and cuckoo clocks. With its mix-and-match cameras and simulated audience participation, it marshals a chorus-line of back-garden dancers in matching denim tops and a cast decked out in homemade props (check out the king’s pan-lid crown) to produce a show bursting with panto’s ramshackle spirit.
After a dispute over stolen cabbages, Lacey’s bumptious Witch claims Olivia Sloyan’s Rapunzel as her own and brings her up in lockdown isolation, making sure to maintain her supplies of pasta, paracetamol and loo roll. It’s as daft as it is enthusiastic, cheekily aware of its own topicality even as it keeps a grip on the story’s urgency.
Broadcast in 10-minute helpings through the week, it is a joyful act of resilience. Oh, yes it is!
Cinderella is available to watch online until 19 April at mercurytheatre.co.uk/cinderella-online; Rapunzel is available at facebook.com/sthelenstheatreroyal.
