I do believe in fairies. I do believe in fairies. I also believe that the tills will ring out louder than Tinkerbell for Northern Ballet Theatre's new adventures of Peter and the Lost Boys. Celebrating the centenary of JM Barrie's national treasure, artistic director David Nixon and co-director Patricia Doyle have injected the F-factor: festive family fun. The accent is on theatre rather than ballet, although there are some memorable pas de deux for Peter and his Shadow, clever toe-to-toe and back-to-back couplings, and, with Wendy, budding romance with lovely lifts and tender lyricism. There's also a magical assemblage of mermaids fanning their webbed tails like exotic underwater plants, and swash-buckling, yo-ho-ho ensembles for the pirates.
It's not the traditional Christmas ballet like The Nutcracker. But it has all the magic of panto, with puppets and special effects that will enchant anyone who loves fairy tales and those who, like Peter, are children who wouldn't grow up.
Despite air traffic control trouble over Neverland (the curtain fell abruptly during Act 1, owing to technical hitches with the flying), the aerial ballet was jolly stuff, the children not so much walking in the air as cavorting and twirling over the rooftops against a star-spangled sky.
American junior principal Christian Broomhall was born to be Pan: mercurial, Puckish, he mastered the wires and flew into our hearts. Beneath all his brash crowing was a sense of deep sadness and isolation. It's tough when you're a perpetual kid home alone. The downside is that Tinkerbell is a fluttering marionette worked by a black-clad dancer. It's a novel approach, but a lost opportunity to create a role for a really feisty fairy. Poignant yet full of childish fun, it's going to be a Christmas favourite.
· Until December 31. Box office: 0113-222 6222.
