Pinocchio

Welcome back to Burley Theatre Group. It’s been a long two years since your last pantomime and I’ve so missed your unique style – I’ve missed the harps, the ukuleles, the eclectic choice of music and the true spirit of community I always feel at Burley.

So, Pinocchio the pantomime, closely follows the traditional story of the toymaker,Gepetto, who creates a wooden puppet toy named Pinocchio and wishes on a star that he would be a real boy. A kindly Fairy appears and grants his wish thus making Pinocchio come alive. Pinocchio learns that he must prove himself worthy in order to make his father's wish come true. With help from tiny Jiminy (or, in this case, Jemima) Cricket, Pinocchio comes across challenges of temptation such as a sly fox and his cat sidekick and a greedy puppeteer. And there the similarity ends.

As I said earlier, Burley’s pantomimes have a unique style – in this case, there was no principal boy or girl, and the good Fairy Nuff, was the Dame. But it all worked just as well.

The battle between good and evil was fought between Fairy Nuff, played as a Dame by Damian Burras, and Stromboli, played by Rob Leach. Damian has grown into the Dame role (obviously, has been practicing during lockdown) and worked the audience beautifully with his scripted and unscripted dialogue. Rob played the villainous Italian circus owner with a suitable degree of nastiness, without being overly evil.

Stromboli was helped by 2 fairly incompetent assistants in his wrongdoings – a fox and a cat. Look, this is pantomime. John Fox (Lauren Varley) and Max Cat (Kathy Jackman) were a brilliantly comedic couple whose stage presence and vocals werefirst class. They made it very difficult to hate them. And a special mention to Lorraine Penhale, who created their makeup, and whoever costumed them. Brilliant.

Husband and wife team, Tony and Amanda Clegg, played Jemima Cricket and Geppetto. As stalwarts of Burley Theatre Group, they never fail to deliver a polished performance. I’m not sure how Tony does it – one minute he’s Geppetto, the next he’s got his guitar round his neck playing and singing. A very talented household.

Ceris Manger, as Pinocchio, is new to the Society and what a valuable asset she is going to be. She is one of those rare performers who can sing, act and dance. Loved the tapdance.

Support was ably provided by Clive Sawyer, James Jones-Tinsley and Laura Thompson.

Of course, all these performances come to nothing without the people working tirelessly behind the scenes – the Stage Manager, James Jones-Tinsley and his team -  sound and lighting, Andrew Horton, John Barker and George Peters ; the set building and painting team ; costumes, Pam Leach and the cast ; makeup, Lorraine Penhale.

Everything worked well to enhance the on stage performances.

The production team of Pam Leach (Director), Tony Clegg (Musical Director) and  Ceris Manger (Choreographer) should be really pleased and proud of the end product, that kept the capacity audience entertained on a damp Thursday evening. One of the things I love about Burley’s pantomimes is the choice of music – nowhere else uses great songs like John Lennon’s “Beautiful Boy” and ELO’s “Living Thing”. And a special mention to Clare Richards for the blistering violin work to the latter. And, it’s not only the choice but the delivery – harps, ukuleles, acoustic guitars. Who needs backing tracks?

It’s been a difficult couple of years for us all in amateur theatre so it’s a delight and pleasure to see that everybody at Burley Theatre Group is back together entertaining the people of Burley. Thanks for the hospitality and I look forward to your next production.

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