The Pied Piper

Many thanks to Pontesbury Players for inviting me to see their production of The Pied Piper written by Martin Jones at Pontesbury Public Hall on Saturday 3rd February 2024. The show told the classical Pied Piper Story with all of the elements required for a fun evening of pantomime.

Kelsey Stevens directed the show with music provided by Iestyn Korsak and Andrew Campbell-Curtis.

It was great to see the amount of local support for this mainly youthful group of performers and it wasn’t long before everyone was in full audience pantomime mode.

The Pied Piper is a different type of pantomime with a narrative mainly around the falsehoods of the council of the town, with a Mayor played by Jane Pemberton and her bodyguard played by David Williams.  The Mayor takes the money from the townsfolk to pay the rat catcher played by Helen Haigh but siphons money off to pay for the luxury hats and gowns of Alexis the Mayors wife played by Malcolm Whittall. Malcolm was a lovely dame complete with celebratory hat piled high with actual celebration and roses chocolate boxes.

Of course this means that the town is still plagued with rats. The leader of the pack is Daddy Rat played by Sian Campbell-Curtis and Trevor his son played by Luke Griffith, who kept the audience in stitches throughout the evening and worked well in the delivery of the dialogue together. There were plenty of ad libs along the way but these really added to the fun as Sian worked the audience with her magic. I particularly liked the wallpapering scene to the music of ‘Yakety Sax’, not because my name was revealed in large letters on one of the rolls of wallpaper but because it was staged well and descended into complete chaos, which enveloped the whole hall, much to the delight of the audience.

In the chaos of the rodents and from the public outcry from the villagers the Town Crier, played by John Lewis at this performance, announces that a new rat catcher is to be found. The first to apply is Gordon Zola played by Dylan Bebb, ably assisted by Rowena Dent played by Natasha Leoci, who demonstrates that he will dress as a piece of cheese to attract the rats before trampling the rats to death. As the only candidate for the job it looks like the village has no hope in cleaning up the diseases caused by the rats until the Pied Piper appears, played by Guy Campbell-Curtis. It is great to see how Guy is developing on stage and this year his dialogue full of rhyme reminded me of a noble Shakespearean actor.

Adele Thain played the Rat Catchers wife and Evie Sullivan played Nigel their son. Nigel of course falls in love with the Mayors daughter (Tracey) and the whole thing is sealed with a lovely duet.

George Rowe played the final character of the Man-eating tree in the weird wood and along with villagers, rats and village children the cast was complete.

The ultraviolet opening scene complete with steam from the sewers and lots of rats did deserve the round of applause given by the audience and I liked the ‘Horrorizon payment computer’ and large rat trap.

There was a lovely tribute paid to celebrate the life of Martin Jones (1950-2024) Pontesbury Players’ king (and Dame) of Panto when the audience stood for a minute’s applause during the finale. A true gentleman, who will be sadly missed by all who had been lucky to meet him.

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