Humpty Dumpty

Simon Dodwell had written this Panto and Deben first performed it 12 years ago and now with a few modern tweaks he brought it right up to date, bringing many of the old nursery rhyme characters together living in Nurseryville. Simon told me that many of the children these days haven’t heard of nursery rhymes but the younger members of this cast certainly found their characters amusing.

I really liked the fact that there wasn’t an ensemble but that all the young people in the cast were characters in their own right. There were about 24 younger cast ranging in age from 8 to 17 years old, and included ‘The Queen of Hearts’, ‘Little Jack Horner’ and ‘Twinkle Twinkle Little Star’ to name but a few. They had numerous musical numbers which were performed confidently and with bags of energy. Mention must go to Jo and Mel for their choreography.  It was very effective and designed to suit the ability of all their young cast. It allowed them to inject life and enthusiasm, in a controlled way, without losing the characteristics of their individual roles and yet still remaining perfectly in time with each other. No mean feat for these impressive young performers.

The story is narrated by Oaky, the Oak Tree and Wall played by Nikki Brown and Jo Rayner who kept up the pace filling in on some of the scene changes, which along with some ‘front of tabs’ scenes ensuring changes were quick and efficient.  Simon Dodwell played ‘Old Mother Hubbard’ and I’m sure he won’t mind me saying, that over the years has polished this art perfectly with just the right level of humor to suit both young and older audience members. We also meet ‘Simple Simon’, (Sam Broadley) ‘Little Miss Muffett’ (Debbie Osborne) and ‘Tom Tom’ (Darren Scriven). The four of them worked well together in communicating with their audience and bouncing off each other with their slapstick comedy. 

The ‘baddie’ here was ‘The Crooked Man’ played by Neill Pearce along with his Cat, Emmi-Dawn Garnett. Both captured the humor in their roles, Neil with an evil laugh that gave the audience ample opportunity to hiss and boo and Cat with her never ending hatred of being fed fish!  Jack and Jill (Chris Perry and Samantha Harvey) brought good measures of comedy and energy to their characters and kept the pace and storyline on track.  Their daughter Mary (Amelie Dineen) was not a happy child until she met ‘Boy Blue’ played by Becky Taylor.  Becky gave a confident performance, as principal boy in both her singing and acting. Meanwhile Mary is put under a spell and becomes ‘Humpty Dumpty’, spending much of the second act sitting on top of the wall waiting to be pushed off. Not an easy role to play as much of the time she was onstage she was inactive, but she played it with a quiet confidence. She was able to transform easily from an irritable teenager to a happier girl once released from the spell and reunited with ‘Boy Blue’. As with any traditional Panto there has to be a happy ending and together they made a delightful couple and brought a warmth to their roles.  I have already mentioned the juniors but the whole cast gave  entertaining performances with lots of energy into all the musical numbers.   

This was a well directed piece with good pace and humour. The set and lighting all effectively added to the atmosphere and all the individual costumes for this large cast were imaginative and well fitting. This was still just their opening night but their audience were all totally enthralled by these characters and  were enthusiastic in their participation. Indeed when the time came to ask a few of the children in the audience to join them on stage, the stage was instantly filled, all wanting to join in. Well done to all the cast and crew on giving us all a very enjoyable evening. Many thanks also to Steve for his hospitality and to all Deben members for their warm welcome.

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