Beauty and the Beast

It is always a pleasure to be invited to Spennymoor Stage and Song productions and this year’s pantomime “Beauty and the Beast” was no exception, from the hospitality received from the front of house staff to meeting the cast at the interval, the commitment from everyone involved is obvious from the minute you entered the venue.
This production was a first for me, whilst I have seen the well know production of the Disney’s musical Beauty and the Beast It was first in terms of the pantomime and not knowing what to expect the joint Directors certainly provided their interpretation of this well know love story.

Whilst the story line has some similarities the well known characters which we all associate with this story are obviously missing but the directors ensured that they combined the well known story and the traditional ethos of a pantomime together to bring us a well polished production. Music as ever was in the capable hands of musical director Martyn Jones and his town band Jackie Adamson and David Young supported the cast with there many songs which were all put over tunefully and with obvious enjoyment.
As ever with this society the scenery was excellent, beautiful coloured cloths and excellent props which for me enhanced and ensured this was an excellent professional production as were the costumes which were appropriate and colourful, lighting was effective and the special effects were good especially the UV scenes which were visually effective. All the principals gave good performances especially Alex Graham as Fairy Rose who narrated us through the show, good stage presence and I enjoyed here musical number “He”. Susan Raper had the difficult part of playing both Prince Jasper and Prince Casper this was a difficult role as she had to deliver the different personalities of both the evil Prince and the good Prince which she capably performed, well done Susan you delivered both parts well, and I enjoyed your musical number “You’ll Never Get Away From Me”.
Eric Hickson who normally plays the dame delivered a striking performance this year as the Beast, great costume and I loved his interpretation of his musical number “Nothing’s Gonna Harm You”. Adrian Raynard-Lant gave a confident performance as Widow Bonbon the panto dame, good costumes and I enjoyed his musical number “Let Me Be Your Jelly Baby” The dames children Sherbet played by Liam Etherington, Candy played by Ann Marie Clayton and Flossy played by Claire Smith for me were the stars of the show they worked the audience throughout bouncing off each other, I loved the costumes and they delivered some great musical numbers I particularly enjoyed “Mr Blue Sky”, “If Mama Was Married” and “Do You  Hear The People Sing”.

I also enjoyed the traffic warden characters Nosey Parker played by Rosie Naylor and Kirby Crawler played by Rebekah Newman great character performances and very entertaining and again delivered their musical number “Bad Guys” good. There were also some terrific supporting performances from Roger Peebles as Dr Tootle and his daughter Bonnie played by Jayne Etherington, Tracy played by Lucy Greathead and the enchanted castle voice delivered by Richard Butler.

It was also nice to see the junior chorus all of them clearly enjoying the experience and delivering some excellent performances alongside the townsfolk played by Eve Angstmann, Heidi Angstmann, Lola Billingham, Aaron Calder, Amber Cooke, May Dargue, Sally Davison, Olivia Dent, Zac Greenman, Bethany Hitchen, Maddidon Lllingworth, Christopher Jones, Amyleigh Maughan, Layla McMahon, Abbie Newman, Sophie Preistley and Jessica Riley. Well done to everyone at Spennymoor Stage and Song for delivering a sound performance. 

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