With today's G2 feature on festive frolics it seems a good time to be planning your Christmas entertainment. Those allergic to panto dames will be pleased to hear that there is plenty of non-tinsel theatre over the coming season. This week alone sees a number of major openings including Neil LaBute's In a Dark House at the Almeida, August: Osage Country at the National, and The Pride and Wig Out! at the Royal Court.
Looking ahead into December, it's worth remembering that the really good pantos will sell out. Along with Mother Goose at Hackney Empire, your best bets are Oxford Playhouse, Theatre Royal, York, and Nottingham Playhouse. The Theatre Royal Stratford East effort has been a major disappointment in recent years, but maybe Hansel and Gretel will be a return to form. Phil Willmott meanwhile, has written and directed Aladdin at the Corn Exchange in Newbury.
If you're north of the border, there is plenty of panto choice - but if you're looking for something a little more grown-up, I would thoroughly recommend La Clique. Liverpool Playhouse has Boeing-Boeing and there's the wartime farce See How They Run at the Royal Exchange in Manchester. Meanwhile, Alan Ayckbourn says goodbye to Scarborough with a new musical, Awakening Beauty.
The deliciously twisted Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea is back at BAC at the beginning of December, while the Barbican offers the opportunity to perfect your rumba with School of Dance, led by Miss High Leg Kick or celebrate Christmas with OAP-turned-rap-star, Ida Barr.
The Union is staging a panto for adults, It's Behind You, which is likely to be a feast of filth, and I'm seriously contemplating a trip to Warwick to see Talking Birds' Trevor Goose and His Night of Lights. If you fancy some ghost stories, Oh Whistle is at Baron's Court and there are more Dick Barton adventures in The Devil Wears Tweed at the Warehouse in Croydon.
The Young Vic has a top-notch record for Christmas shows that are a little bit different, and the rainforest entertainment of Amazonia is a good bet for the over-sevens. Hampstead is tackling The Little Prince, Southwark is staging Philip Pullman's Scarecrow and His Servant and the Polka has Michael Rosen's Pinocchio. The charming Clockheart Boy at the Jeanetta Cochrane was one of the sleeper word-of-mouth hits of Edinburgh. I'll hoping to catch Great Expectations at the Library in Manchester and Matilda and Duffy's Stupendous Space Adventure at the Watermill.
Arabian Nights at the New Vic, Newcastle-under-Lyme is likely to be worth seeing and the sheer number of Christmas Carols around the country suggest that theatre programmers foresaw the credit-crunch long before Gordon Brown. Pick of the bunch could be at the Tobacco Factory in Bristol, which has done some great Christmas shows in recent years.
If you have very young children, Bristol Old Vic reopens on December 27 with Travelling Light's Home. Also worth mentioning are Oily Cart's How Long is a Piece of String at the Unicorn – which will almost certainly be worth treasuring – and Fevered Sleep's Brilliant at the Lyric, which is just that. Fairytale inspired non-pantos include Sleeping Beauty at the Unicorn and Simply Cinderella, a new musical at the spanking new Curve in Leicester. Melly Still's Cinderella is at the Lyric Hammersmith and Told by an Idiot's excellent Beauty and the Beast, at the Lyric last year, is now at Warwick Arts Centre. I'm looking forward to Hansel and Gretel in Newcastle and at the Barbican, and Mike Kenny's The Snow Queen at West Yorkshire Playhouse is likely to be very good too.
Do tell me what you are booking for and why, and remember: if you can't bear the thought of festive theatre, you could just stay home and read next year's brochures. There are some crackers coming our way in 2009.
