Snow White
Information
- Date
- 5th December 2023
- Society
- High Green Musical Theatre Group
- Venue
- Eppic Tgeatre
- Type of Production
- Pantomime
- Director
- Rachel Marshall
- Musical Director
- Chris Smith
- Choreographer
- Becky Gregory
- Producer
- Becky Gregory
- Written By
- Rachel Marshall
I was delighted to be invited to see your Annual pantomime Snow White. The title now shortened to maintain correctness but cleverly written to still include all the original historic story . High Green MTG continue to be a community based theatre group, with established families involved over many years with this year being no exception. The inclusion and encouragement clearly given with the widest age range on stage will surely secure continuation of this most welcoming established society. From Harvey who had recently celebrated his 99 th birthday to two of the young ladies treading the boards at the ripe age of 3 . This is a real credit to the all-inclusive group.
Rachel not only produced but along with her husband wrote the most amusing script. The panto was well directed throughout and along with Becky Gregory assisted by Emily Cordon achieved many memorable scenes , allowing all the cast space to perform and the audience to clearly see. As you would expect this production included all the usual pantohighlights. The baking scene , the laundry, ghost scenes , heroes and villains , plenty of thigh slapping along with slapstick moves and comedic silliness. All to achieve a great evening of fun and laughter. Chris Smith as your MD clearly had provided plenty of guidance for the many musical numbers. The mini orchestra ,to the back of the stage ,maintained sensible sound levels allowing both spoken and sung words to be heard, whilst not in an ideal position most probably worked better as the performers didn’t have mics and relied on clear diction and effective projection. The inventive writing came up with many characters being named as forms of weather, quite appropriate after the last few months.!!
Windy performed by Harry Lynch-Bowers ,the larger than life silly Billy of the panto, provided many magical comedy moments with the usual array of jokes designed cleverly to appeal to young and old alike. Fronted some good ensemble pieces, the lively opening leading into the Beatles song medley with Snow White played by Libby Rawson and the ensemble cast . Set in the laundry scene , a clever choice of song titles including Help, Hard Days Night, If Theres Anything I can Do and With love from me to You . Libby,Snow White, well done some lovely scenes with cast members along with your duet of ‘You’re too good to be True ‘with the Prince, very clear diction throughout along with ‘Let it Shine ‘ with the ‘Colours’ . Fairy Forecast by Becki Gregory with every entrance preceded by the mobile phone ring tone, and then into well written and delivered mini sketches talking as if to many well-known panto characters, Peter Pan, Aladdin, Jack, Elsa and many more, great fun along with moving the panto along with the good pace. Sunshine the Cook by Jonny Glaves, The Dame , outrageous costumes, strong performance , lovely rapport when reacting to the audience along with well delivered sketches. The baking scene with Windy, the Audience song to name but two. Queen Thunder by Carpenter Lockwood, the evil one , a very well performed and delivered performance, great singing along with winding up the audience with copious amounts of boos , well done. San Graham-Levers as the Mirror, well delivered cameo part ,lovely solo of Who is that Girl I See , not always telling the evil Queen what she wanted to hear, much to the delight of the audience. Blizzard by Ben Shipman along with his henchmen Rain by Alan Kay and Hail by Lyndsay Linley delivered some lovely sketches, good diction, comedicmoments, and fed of each other well, under the ever more frustrated Blizzard. Your Pop group sketch was a stand out between the three of you resulting in Blizzard sliding down the wall in despair, great fun. Prince Gale by Emily Corden , a commanding performance, plenty of thigh slapping, managing to avoid the evil Queen to win over Snow White along with your well delivered duet with Snow White of ‘ Your too good to be True’ ,well done.
The 7 actors playing the part of the colours .what enjoyment you had depicting the original characters we no longer name. Throughout your scenes your characterisation never dropped and you should all be thrilled with the results. I can’t help but mention Harvey when revealing his colour saying ‘ My name is Indigo….not many know that ‘ great fun. Your number ‘ Let it Shine’ delivered really well along with scenes in the woods with Snow White. Well done. We were thrilled to see the White ensemble team but am sure team 2 all performed just as well, remaining in character throughout with lots of smiles and enjoying the many and varied full ensemble pieces.
The costumes all looked very in keeping and must say how impressive the circus themed opening to Act 2 looked, along with beautiful rainbow swags. The set whilst simple worked well and the lighting commendable .
Thank you all for a fun panto evening , wonderful front of house hospitality and delighted you are performing to your appreciative sell out audiences.
My apologies if I have missed anyone or got the names incorrect but totally understand you not having the expense of a programme.
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