PANTOMIMES come in many different guises – glitzy and heavy with celebrities (some of whom you may have heard of), beautifully costumed with lavish sets, clever and funny, warm-hearted, full of local jokes and music catering to every taste from grandparents to toddlers … Some have a special place in their community, and that is…
IF pantomime is all about larger than life traditional characters, audience participation, local references, current memes (of course 6-7 is everywhere this year), love, goodies, baddies, singing and dancing, lots of great songs and a happy ending, then Poole Lighthouse is the place to go this Christmas. Chris Jarvis, the man behind the Poole panto…
THOUGHT the dastardly Captain Hook had met his watery fate at the end of Peter Pan’s adventures? … think again. Perhaps unsurprisingly he found a way to stay alive in the water at the end of the plank he was forced to walk, and, after desolate years of fury and plotting, HE’S BACK! And when…
JUST across the road from the stage door of Bristol Hippodrome is a public house which until recent times was called The Bunch of Grapes, where you would very often encounter stars appearing in the Hippo enjoying a pre, or post show, drink. With the pub’s change of name to Smoke and Mirrors, those days…
SOUTHAMPTON’s Mayflower Theatre, which has one of the region’s biggest Christmas shows, welcomes glamorous star Alexandra Burke to head the cast as a swashbuckling villain in The Pantomime Adventures of Peter Pan, running from 13th December to 4th January. Neverland is full of intrigue, colour and adventure, with Dr Ranj as the Magical Merman, and…
FROM information overload in the rehearsal room to swashbuckling villainy on stage, Bath Theatre Royal’s 2025 pantomime team are hard at work, preparing for the big opening next week, still learning lines, routines, dance steps, songs and music … ‘You have information coming at you from every angle,” says Bath favourite, script-writer and comedian Jon…
AFTER what seems like centuries of watching and reviewing pantomimes, it is always a great thrill to spot a superstar performance on a local stage, and wait until the national critics and award-giving organisations put that name in their best-of-the-year lists. Salisbury Playhouse’s inventive, colourful, energetic and 100% fun version of Jack and the Beanstalk…
THERE is rich magic running through the Brewhouse Christmas show this year, and it seems to emanate from the mysterious rhynes and mumps around the county town, which can be surrounded in fast-rising water almost without warning, turning it into a different land. Sound a bit “woo-woo”? – well, maybe. Writer and director Sasha Wilson…
IF there is one thing a pantomime dame needs, it is to be seen – or perhaps B-Scene, as the newest company in the area is called. The Yeovil-based group will be bringing panto to Sherborne this Christmas, and it’s the perennial favourite story of Cinderella In this version, the wicked Morsus and the Ugly…
WHEN Clara’s mysterious aunt arrives at the family’s grand Christmas ball with a strange gift, she brings unexpected excitement to the festivities. Find out more when Taunton’s Brewhouse theatre presents The Nutcracker (Not the Ballet) this Christmas, from 2nd to 28th December. Join Clara (Nell Baker) on this magical Christmas Eve when her Nutcracker doll…