Sleeping Beauty

This was my first visit to Menston Thespians and a most enjoyable visit it was. The hall was packed with excited children and they certainly enjoyed this pantomime.

There was a good serving of humour from Dolly Tubbs (Steve Millward), who took on the role of the royal nanny and her son Tommy (Rob Place), who put his heart and soul into his perfomance. Tommy was well matched with his bride to be Rosie (Debz Taylor) and there was more humour from the slow moving Hawksworth (Martin Holmes). There was just the right amount of spiders, gorillas and ghosts to give the children plenty to shout about. A delightful Princess Beauty (Victoria Wilkinson) and a handsome Prince Andrew (Sally Clegg) were a well matched couple. The whole cast worked well together with good and bad fairies providing lots of opportunities to boo and cheer.

There was some well thought out choreography and I particularly enjoyed the 'Thriller' dance as I'm sure the dancers did too.

There are always plenty of set changes in a pantomime and these moved smoothly from scene to scene.  Some of the backcloths were a little dull especially in the opening scene but fortunately the bright and attractive costumes cheered them up.

The final wedding scene was wonderful to watch. It was well thought out and everyone, right down to the smallest child, sang and moved to perfection. This was a most enjoyable production and I look forward to the next one.

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