Aladdin and the Valley of the Dragons

Thank you for inviting me to your production of Aladdin and the Valley of the Dragons which the director wrote originally in 2006 and updated it for this year’s January Pantomime. The show had all the elements of a traditional pantomime with some clever story lines and imaginative features, but with a running time of three hours was a little on the long side. 

The cast were excellent and worked very well together. They had great characterisation and the fun they were having transferred easily to the audience. Aladdin was a great principal boy played with lots of charm and expression in contrast to the stroppy petulant principal girl Lotus Blossom. Both the Dame and Abanazer; the baddie were perfect. The Dame had bags of energy, exaggerated gestures, and a lovely, gossipy persona and Abanazer was deliciously evil with his raspy voice, evil laugh and superb physicality. Both had excellent comic timing, ad-libbing without being over the top and held the audience in the palms of their hands. 

The set had been very well designed with some excellent hand painted drops of Old Peking and the dragon caves with great lighting effects which really added to the authenticity and atmosphere. There were also some clever set pieces including a steamer in Widow Twankey’s laundry complete with bubbles and a dragon with an opening mouth, lights and smoke. The colourful and authentic costumes were excellent and really enhanced the production. The kimonos, Chinese tunics and trousers were fabulous and definitely transported me to ancient China.

Congratulations to the director and all the cast on taking us on your adventure in the Valley of the Dragons and for your energetic and enthusiastic production.

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