Cinderella and Friends

A good audience and a front of house crew that knows how to relate to children.  What more could you ask for in this, the final pantomime of this season?   The audience was, probably, 50% children and this is a huge challenge for a company as they need to keep the children interested throughout the show.

The opening number, Colour My World, was well performed and set the standard for the whole show.  The Principals were all excellent, with the shows author, Sue Newman, taking the role as the Old Fairy Godmother.  The two princes were well played by Emma Newman (Prince Rupert) and Melissa Crisp (Prince Eric).   Emma also doubled as the young Fairy Godmother and she performed both characters very well.  Melissa regularly plays lead roles in Merlin’s panto’s and she is always excellent.  Both these actors have good strong singing voices, although I would have liked to see more vocal support from the chorus for Melissa when she sang Don’t Stop Me Now.

The leading ladies Cinderella, played by Emily Taylor, and Snow White, played by Leanne Manton were good.  Leanne, in particular, was very animated (as a Disney Princess should be!).  They also, both, have lovely singing voices.   Oliver Gafga played Jack well, he is making a speciality of doing great ‘prat falls’ and he has a great sense of comedy timing.   Although his singing was a bit quiet, especially when he was singing with a stronger vocalist like Stephanie Bassett who played Little Red Riding Hood.

Jeremy Battersby and Steven Taylor played the two Ugly Sisters Gerty and Berty and great fun they were too.  Their ability to get the audience involved, without it appearing forced, was excellent.  Melissa Berrecloth was the Wicked Stepmother and, once again, showed us her talent for playing baddies!  She has a very strong stage presence and works the audience well, perfect for pantomime!   My compliments to Holly Berrecloth and Holly Riley who played Daisy the cow.  These two young ladies had, obviously, worked hard to make sure that their performance was co-ordinated and they performed well.  The Principal line-up was completed by Emma Bellinger as Jack’s Ma and Stuart Reynolds, playing, in his own words, all the other parts!  In fact, he played the Steward, the Huntsman and the Wolf.  Three very disparate characters and each one was different, well done.

The ensemble, mostly children, were very good at their parts and dances and the featured dancers were excellent and a credit to their dance teacher.  I particularly liked the ‘beanstalk’ dance.  The songs in the show, this year, were particularly well chosen and sung with vigour.  This usually implies that the cast like the songs! 

The scenery was good and yes, I did notice Emma’s glitter!  Some of the scene change blackouts seemed unnecessarily long so my compliments to key board player, Ashton Moore, who kept the underscore music going through the scene changes.   The costumes were outstanding, I particularly liked the Wicked Stepmothers costumes, but they were all beautiful.  Lighting was a bit suspect on one or two occasions and, unfortunately, the stage lighting circuit blew in the middle of the second half.  Full credit to the company who carried on as though nothing had happened, and the backstage crew managed to restore order very quickly.  There were some problems with the mics but this is just one of those things and, if I remember correctly, has happened before in this venue.

My congratulations to author, Sue Newman, for keeping the show under 2 hours, this was particularly notable in the fact that there were very few children being escorted out during the performance.  A good sign that they were engaged with the show!

It was so lovely to see a large cast and a large audience, my congratulations to all for a most enjoyable afternoons entertainment.

© NODA CIO. All rights reserved.