Beauty and the Beast

With a cast that was inclusive of all age groups this production from Waterloo and Crosby Theatre Company of Beauty and the Beast written and directed by Elspeth Fisher was a very enjoyable family pantomime performed by a talented and enthusiastic cast. The show began with Goodie a very forgetful fairy nicely played by Rita Derringer who looked like most children's idea of a fairy. She tells us some of the background to the story, about how a selfish young Prince was turned into a Beast by the Witch Hazel played by Sarah Henshaw with an unusual mixture of malevolence and likability which worked very well, I enjoyed Sarah’s rendition of  Bet Midler’s arrangement of “I Put a Spell on You” from the film Hokus Pokus . Fairy Goodie and Which Hazel appear together at intervals throughout the pantomime supposedly to update the audience. They both worked very well together with a good comic banter especially when the overworked and forgetful Fairy Goodie thought she was opening the pantomime again. There were good performances from Taylor Anne Henwood as Belle who sang and acted well and she was nicely complimented by David Johnson as Prince Valiant/Beast who also had a good singing voice, they made a very good pantomime couple. Linda Henson did her usual great job as Madame Fifi ,she demonstrated once again that this role can be played by a woman without compromising the usual Pantomime tradition of a man playing the Dame. Linda was helped in her comedy capers by David Walker as her son D’Artagnon who also had a good rapport with the audience and another very good entertaining Comedy duo who worked well together came from Joe Coyne as L'Escargot and Simon Henderson as Fwargras the castle Guards. both actors had very good comic timing. Josh Coyne was also a hit with the audience as Elton the village man of the moment, who all the girls swooned over and who appeared to have very similar characteristics to the great Elvis Presley. Simon James as Monsieur Camembert the castle Butler kept all the servants in line and Robin Leyland was Belle’s Father Maurice.

There were also nice important performances by the actors in the supporting roles of Belle’s three sisters, their village suiters and named castle savants. I would like to name everyone but  there are quite a few and I don’t want to miss anyone out. The chorus of villages, servants and children a number of which had the Ah! factor all performed with a great deal of enthusiasm supporting the principal cast very well and looking if they were enjoying themselves immensely.

There were some backing tracks used but the majority of the music was by a live band which was led by Ann Dickinson they played and supported the cast excellently and choreography by Claudia Molyneux was well thought out and suited the production. There were also some special routines for the young children some of which included some excellently performed acrobatics which went down very well with the audience. Generally, the acting and singing was good and the pace of the production was just right. The scenery and props enhanced the show and fitted the venue well and costumes were bright and colourful and also fitted the production, it was obvious thought had gone into getting them just right.

Usually the way to measure the success of a pantomime is from the audience’s reaction and despite that on the night we attended there was only a small audience there was still plenty of the usual responses expected for a pantomime with lots of boos, it’s behind you and Oh no he didn't.
Congratulations to Elspeth Fisher and to all involved in this very enjoyable production thank you for inviting us, we had a lovely evening.

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