Dick Whittington

Whenever you get invited last minute to something and you start going through the process of event jiggling, robbing time off Peter to pay Paul, it does come to the point where you sit and think “this better be bloody worth it”.

With a last minute invite to Storth Entertainers production of Dick Whittington,  I hastily got in touch with my NODA partner in crime and set off for the venue.

Having experienced a couple of productions in this hall, I was looking forward to see how a pantomime would go down in such an intimate venue. People, of course, already know the story of Dick Whittington going off to London to seek his fortune, so I'm not going to labour too much on the backstory.

The role of Dick was undertaken by Katherine Waterhouse who gave us a well paced and very earnest Dick, moving the show from scene to scene effortlessly - happily slapping her thighs and singing away, we were all rooting for Dick from the opening.

Ava Ladell played Tommy, Dick’s cat with grace, style and elegance. Ava showed great talent as a performer - with Tommy coming into its own near the end when deciding to speak - pointing out that Tommy was actually the real hero of this story, and not Dick.

Rebecca Ladell played a delightful Alice Fitzwarren with Jason Inman playing her father Alderman Fitzwarren and many other parts besides.

The role of Fairy Bow Bells was played in stunning fashion, by Katie Kay. Katie's Fairy Bow Bells was played incredibly tongue-in-cheek by Katie with each line being cut off just before it got to adult humour level.

King Rat was played by Katie Brown. Katie was great in the role, relishing the boos and hisses from the audience - Katie seemed to like her boos, and, on occasion, liked to get hissed.

King Rat's sidekicks Ratso and Ratilda played by Jack Hemsley and Fearne McCormick were really well done, often with some wordy dialogue between them. It was delivered at such a pace that the audience were never bored.

This finally brings us down to Gloria Fabulous, the dame of the piece, and Idle Jack, played by Steven Henneberry and Abbie Cooper, respectively. Abbie's Idle Jack was one of the best village idiot roles I've seen in a long time, knowing exactly what to do and how to play the audience, never taking it too far, and easily pulling it back whenever necessary – excellent performance.

Steven Henneberry’s Gloria Fabulous...... Well, all I can say is - if Steven didn't work in Funny Girls before, he should. With a wicked sense of fun, great perception of the ridiculous, and tongue in cheek humour, Steven’s Dame was great.  In the show, some of the lines, if not delivered right, could easily produce sharp intakes of breath and a possible 12 rating- Steven knew just how to deliver these.

In fact, there were quite a few “near the knuckle” lines In this panto, but every performer had been schooled perfectly in how to deliver them so that the parents understood, but the kids were still in bewilderment at what they were seeing, rather than what they were hearing.

All singing and dancing was delivered well by the company- even managing to add a song from a Book of Mormon which I must say I never thought I'd see in any kind of family entertainment-genius!

If I had one small negative it would be that the chorus could have been fuller / had more to do / more chorus involvement. Although, of course, the pandemic may have had a lot to do with numbers (as seems to have been the case in lots of productions), and how difficult the last two years have been for local theatres to be able to actually continue with any production, let alone a production with more than a handful of people.

Musical Director Alan Gardner had worked hard with the company, and it showed.

The show was written and directed by Steven Henneberry (yes, the one playing Gloria). Steven should be really pleased and proud of what the whole company achieved with this production - this was a really good, well written pantomime.

So ...... was cancelling other plans worth it it?

Oh yes it was.

Thank you Storth, for your invite, and your hospitality

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