Ali Baba and The Forty Thieves

A very warm welcome from the F of H team and good to see so many familiar faces once again. It certainly was very cold  and foggy outside, and a hot cup of coffee was just what was needed before we warmed up the temperature and travelled to the land full of Eastern promise. We entered a world of palm trees, bazaars, belly dancers, forests, caves, flying carpets, princes and princesses, scoundrels and thieves, good overcoming evil, awful jokes with a lot of laughter, a bit of slapstick interwoven with ‘variation on a theme script’ assisted by, on the book Sheila Gault. Modern musical interludes, eastern dance sequences and a clever Scheherazade who volunteered her hand in marriage telling the amazing story of Ali Baba, to the Sultan beheader of wives, but this time only wanted to hear more of the tale therefore she survived. The thieves’ stolen loot is discovered by Ali who is locked in the cave in error eventually released and for his trouble and rewarded for bringing the baddies to justice. All the panto ingredients we love to see with plenty of audience responses and everyone who is good lives happily ever after.

Jackie was back in the director's chair using her flair, this time giving Pippa Shepherd the opportunity of  baring badness as Dalmatia Evil Queen of the East, dressed rather strikingly in black and white including her hair, with a dalmatian draped around her costume who banged mightily with a strong rod and of course was naturally brought to grovel.  And to do this was our good Pharoah Cat by the name of Caterina, most confidently played by Bobby Jeal looking resplendent in black and gold with a perfect Pharoah headdress and a purr…fect  painted nose.

Multi-tasking as usual, Chairman Kate introduced the audience to housekeeping rules encouraging the audience to join in the fun, she and hubby David were SM’s and Kate was responsible for set design and together with members produced an eastern promise set design, using colourful drapes as a backdrop, a realistic forest of trees, attractive side flats of palms, a strategic bush, and special effects created for the rolling on and off cave entrance which worked really smoothly. The terracotta jars – large cut out placards with ‘hat’ lids hid the thieves in the palace were particularly funny particularly when one spoke. A magical moment was wonderful as clouds hung from a black background the Marjana appeared to be floating by on a magic carpet. Most effective.

Newcomer Russell Hall won over the audience – excellent makeup and costumes showed his belly movement rather well as lovable Dame Fatima Fandango an ex-belly dancer sharing his diet with us. Mustafa Screwloose, great play on words, oversaw his mistress’s fully laden bazaar cart with attached lettering cleverly reorganised to become ASDA  - lovely silly part. allowing Nick Jeal to ‘ham it up’ and loved the sun-tanned rippling muscles. The little ones really enjoying their singing moment on stage. Ollie Pierce – appeared very regal as Crown Prince Haroun working together with Amelia Dahm portraying an attractive Princess Jasmin from Cairo. Clive Moores was royal official The Grand Vizier whilst Lizzie May played his daughter Scheherazade, the gentle storyteller who cleverly agreed to become the Sultan’s next wife –  a character Murray Smith played, who had a penchant for beheading previous wives and, when not on stage, they observed the story unfold sitting side of stage. Al Richardson gave the audience more to boo at as devious king of the thieves Asbad who took on the pair of comedy duo stooges aka Richard Pierce and Steve Tunwell all of course thwarted by Toby Champney’s Ali inadvertently being locked in the thieves’ cave and discovering their ill-gotten gains. He gets rich as a reward and secures Slave girl Marjana with Laura Gale very solid in script and vocals.

The costumes were truly beautiful, saris, head coverings and tunics – most colourful and well-fitting, excellent accessories and very good footwear for all characters. A first-class job by costumier Jill Haskell. Pippa was also MD with the cast working hard with some fairly awkward modern musical numbers to put over together with imaginative choreography well drilled with particularly good co-ordinated hand movements from everyone.

© NODA CIO. All rights reserved.