Crock Of Gold

Written by Eric Fowler, this pantomime is not one of the more commercial titles though does feature several recognisable characters from some of the more classic fairy tales such as Goldilocks, Robinson Crusoe, Sinbad and the nursery rhyme ‘the old woman who lives in a shoe’ (who sadly doesn’t seem to have a name so is given Sarah Sandal for the purposes of this panto).

We watch and follow the troupe as they search for the end of the rainbow (rainbow…rainbow…!) in hope to find the legacy which is the ‘Crock Of Gold’.

In Panto, I look to see if or how any recent news stories have been incorporated into a gag or interpreted into conversation, If nothing is particularly worthy of mention from the news that week, there is always popular TV plots to joke about – we didn’t get any of these which aid towards keeping the piece as up to date and as recent as possible. There was also room for more mentions of the local area and poking at politics which are imperative to this genre of theatre.

Musically, a good selection of songs had been chosen with a mix of recent chart music (‘All About That Bass’) and what panto would be complete this year without the Disney anthem everyone is either humming or watching renditions of on You Tube (‘Let It Go’ – or in this case; ‘Let One Go’).   The group numbers were performed with fun and energetic choreography though the ensemble singing was not as wholesome, volume being the major drawback.

We had some strong individuals amongst the cast who demonstrated how to deliver sturdy pantomime performances; Amanda Ernest was super as the high energy Tommy Tucker, David Livesey steered away from the expected and gave us a suave / comedic Sinbad which thrived and Simon Fletcher returned as the Dame (Sarah Sandal) with expert hosting and Dame traits on display.

As good as this script was – gags and/or skits with these three performers would have benefited the piece, any director can certainly trust these three to be given four minutes or so to devise their own sketch or gag, such interludes of improvisation amongst the principals would have been most welcome.

It’s incredibly challenging to stage performances which require set changes in the space at PADOS house so a huge nod to the stage management and design team for enabling this to happen so smoothly and so quietly!
 
It seems that PADOS have their core members who drive the panto wagon (some of whom I’ve only seen involved in the pantomimes at PADOS) which, compared to other groups in the district is an interesting and encouraging component as it’s not easy to engage people to participate in this art form. For a society to have a base and driving force behind panto amongst its membership is a very fortunate and promising aspect indeed.
A great team effort, congratulations.

© NODA CIO. All rights reserved.