Happy Ever After

On a cold and blustery December’s evening I negotiated the snow covered roads and travelled to Dawdon Miners Welfare Social Club to join the cast of Phoenix Productions who were proudly presenting their 2018 panto “Happy Ever After" (pantoland comes to Seaham), and what a fantastic performance I was in for, from the minute I walked through the door the front of house staff as ever made me feel most welcomed and I loved how the publicity team lead by Sarah Taylor had made reserved flyer posters for the tables, mine was personalised and had a picture of the cast, a very nice touch and a lovely memento to keep. This was no ordinary off the shelf pantomime which came as no surprise, when it comes to Phoenix productions, their talented Director/writer Richenda Blakelock likes to pull out all the stops when it comes to her creative writing and her production this year had an interesting script full of adventure, danger, drama, lots of gags a bit of smut and most of all five missing magic keys, this clever script is staged around a failing wizard who decided to spice up his life, he concocted a spell but due to his failing eye sight and aged wand he mistakenly transports some of our favourite pantomime characters from their cosy homes and relocates them to a new and strange place called Seaham

This for me was a great story line full of all our favourite pantomime characters and from the production I saw it certainly was an audience pleaser, well done Richenda on another original and imaginative piece of writing. No show is complete without the production team, this year in charge of choreography was Rebecca Hunt who did a sterling and creative job with the movement and dance routines, congratulations to wardrobe who ensured that the costumes were appropriate and colourful as necessary for a pantomime thanks to Carol Hackers, Catherine Blacklock and Anita Philips, and finally no production is complete without good sound and lighting and this year sound was in the capable hands of Duncan Baxter and lighting was Elliot Nelson, well done to the whole of the production team who ensured that this production was successful and full of fun from start to finish.

In every pantomime there is always a baddie but in “Happy Ever After” there were two and both were as cold and icy as the weather outside, playing the part of the evil Desdemona was Beth Collins excellent characterisation  and stage presence and she certainly had the audience booing every time she appeared on stage fantastic costume which added to her character particularly  the horns which added to the evilness, great vocals especially in her numbers “If You’re Looking for Trouble”, playing the second evil villain and no stranger to the stage was Hayley O’ Connor as the Rat Queen again a strong character who certainly made the most of her character, Hayley has excellent vocals and I loved her numbers “I Want It All” and her duet with Beth “She’s  A Devil Women".
Not only did Richenda write the pantomime but played the part of the sarcastic Magic Mirror with a bad attitude great performance and an actress who certainly can command the stage, I love her musical number “I Want to Break Free” which was well delivered, Paying the parts of Jack and Jill were Kimberly Dunn and Michelle Borwell I loved these  characters and I was absolutely over the moon when they found each other as was the audience, playing their surrogate mum was Sarah Taylor and it is so nice to see Sarah taking part on stage great acting ability and stage presence, Billie Smith delivered a confident Goldilocks as did Aiden Blacklock as Cashew and Ashton Blakelock as Smee playing the part of Abby the Cat and Genie of the Ring was Jess Smith again great performance in both roles especially as the Cat, beautiful interpretation and she never came out of character whilst on stage, playing the Good Fairy was Lauren Willis lovely performance and charisma and a great rendition of her musical number “I’ve Lost The Magic”. Playing the main three characters were Rebeka Hunt as Aladdin a great performance with good interaction with the other characters confident stage presence and vocally she delivered her musical numbers well especially her duet “Any Thing You Can Do” with  Courtney Knight who played Robin Hood again Courtney delivered this character flawlessly she was very entertaining and had a natural chemistry with the main principals as well as a confident vocal ability I loved her number “So You Had A Bad Day” which was beautifully sang and finally Zoe Cook as Cinderella who as always delivers a  polished performance in all her roles, Zoe is a talented actress and dancer. Her character Cinderella transformed from mouse to dragon as her character’s confidence grew, with alluring stage presence she has the natural ability to captivate the audience and her vocal ability is outstanding I loved her musical number “More To Live” and her duet with Lauren Willis “Sister are Doing It” both numbers were wonderfully delivered.

There were some great cast musical numbers I loved the opening number “Spirits move me” and “Could this be Magic” I enjoyed the full cast singing “The Final Countdown” and “Put on Your Dancing Shoes”, good interpretation to “Take Me Home” and Walking on Sunshine with a little help from panto lyrics and the traditional 12 days of Christmas was very entertaining and original with items found at the beach. This was an exceptional pantomime, well directed by Richenda and the production team and what was nice to see was how the whole cast put their hearts and souls into this production, a special moment for me was the twelve days of Christmas number with Zoe and her seaside sandwich, you needed to be there to appreciate the hilarious and show stopping moment which was purely superb, a splendid performance by everyone and from the audience reaction it certainly demonstrated that this pantomime was well received and enjoyed by all. Well done to everyone at Phoenix Productions on another great production and thank you once again for the invitation and hospitality.

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