Written & Directed by: Paul Johnson
Performed: Fri 19th & 26th January 2007 @ 7.30pm, Sat 20th & 27th @ 2.30pm & 7.00pm,
Sun 21st and 28th @ 1.30pm and 5.30pm at St. Anne's Hall, Wandsworth

SUMMARY

The Club regularly produces pantos where a poor innocent story is tested to the limits of credulity by the essentials of Panto: funny dialogue, ribald jokes, innuendos and double entendres. The show was supported by good scenery, costumes and lighting and sound plots. This show was another credit to Paul Johnson who wrote, directed and even put in an appearance, albeit in disguise.

REPORT

The prologue with Mrs Bunn provided the most aerobic introduction to a panto that I've seen or participated in. Keith Barnes as Mrs Bunn the baker was a Godsend to the land of Panto. He exuded energy and seemed to want to engage with the audience at every opp ortunity.
The Bunn family included Billy Bunn, played by Benjamin Ellis and Jenny Bunn, played by Niki Bencic. Both Billy and Jenny were simple souls yet seemed to have the same rapp ort with the audience as Mrs Bunn. Billy in particular took every opp ortunity to wave or react with the children in the front.

Off the audience were taken to the Land of Hearts where we met the various members of the Heart Royalty. The Queen of Hearts was played regally by Frances Holmes. Her faithful and supp ortive courtier was played by Jenny Davies and Jack the eligible bachel or was handsomely played by Becca Duke the principal boy. As bad jokes go it would be difficult to beat those delivered by Sharron Stubbs as the Joker. She w orked very hard through out the show to give some awful deliveries of some actually very good jokes. She seemed to revel in the cruel jibes of the audience such as ‘get off’. The ‘Heart’ entourage was rounded off by the presence of the ever reliable Ada Halley as Mrs Hart, ably assisted as many have been, by her friend Jack Daniels.

Every Panto plot needs some baddies and these were provided by the menacing Spades. Paula Fitzgerald played the nefarious Ace. Ace’s sidekicks, the Deuce played by Anna Gilbert and Trey played by Julia Coleman, both gave good performances as the tough stooges. The Spades had a simple plan to discredit the House of Hearts by stealing the Queen’s tarts. The simple plot was made m ore complicated by a subsidiary plan of global hegemony starting with the capture the Land of the Hearts, by marrying Jack into the Spade family, then marching into the Lands of the Diamonds and the Clubs.

The show really came to life at the castle of the Wizard Whist. The wizard’s two helpers Riffle, played by Charlotte Alexander and Shuffle, played by Amanda Clarke opened the act with pace and humour. David Russell as the wizard continued the pace, energy and audience engagement. I particularly liked seeing the flying wizard through the hole in the castle wall. After plenty of gags, ‘behind you’s, ‘Oh yes you can, Oh no you can’t’s and chases we met ‘The Thing from the East Wing’. I thought ‘it’ looked rather cuddly and had a much maligned reputation ‘it’ also gave multi talented Paul Johnson the chance to hold centre stage.

Eventually ‘the tarts’ were rest ored to their rightful owner Jack, gets to marry Jenny Bunn, they had always been secretly in love, the Spades are seen off and all ends well in the w orld of Panto.

The show benefited from some good songs with cleverly revised lyrics by Paul Johnson.

Considerable eff ort had clearly been made with the costumes and it seemed that everyone contributed to the set construction to good effect.

The technical aspects of the show were of a high standard.

The Front of House team were attentive and well presented as was the catering team.

I thought that your handbill and programme were once again simple yet striking. The background to the panto story was very interesting and I think added to the audience’s enjoyment of the show. I particularly like the inclusion of the puzzle but missed the cast biogs.

The show was clearly enjoyed by cast and audience alike and was another credit to Paul Johnson and the Club.