St Helens Theatre Royal and Regal Entertainments are doing a grand job of proving that panto, just like puppies and kittens, is not just for Christmas. The venue now offers four opportunities a year to top up your batteries with a good dose of glitter, sequins and pun-laden scripts, and the Easter panto has fast become a staple of the family entertainment calendar here.
Cinderella is every bit a ‘Tale as Old as Time’ as a certain other fairytale that makes the claim, and it is certainly a great fit for the Easter season, with its themes of love and forgiveness, and in this telling it is a real tonic.
Timed to span the school holiday fortnight, this may be a shorter run than the marathon Christmas panto which we know that the Theatre Royal save their full artillery for, but there is no way in which this panto feels in any way scaled down. With Regal’s familiar colourful sets and dazzling costumes, the show punches above its weight in entertainment value. It also features a really prettily done closing scene to Act I, which many pantos would be happy to have as a finale.
Leading the cast are Corrie’s Kimberley Hart Simpson as Cinderella and Benjamin Keith as her Prince Charming. These are familiar faces, but also safe hands, as indeed are those of Lewis Devine, who takes the role of Buttons. As always, it is Devine who effectively comperes the show as well as acting as a comic foil and narrator, and his skill with the ‘golden ticket’ winning children brought up from the audience is exemplary. Another welcome return is Richard Aucott, familiar as many a dame at St Helens, but here bringing us one of the pair of ugly sisters, opposite the almost venomous Shania Pain, and the two, with their repeated claims of “Aren’t we gorgeous?” do some great work.
Completing the main cast are Conor Barrie as Dandidni and Rachel Wood, whose fairy godmother has real charm and a very fine singing voice.
With musical supervision, as always, from Callum Clarke, the show is full of big tunes, and offers plenty of dance numbers for the senior and junior ensembles who are here to fill the stage with movement. Notably, the dancers offer a really atmospheric and imaginative Royal Hunt sequence, which also shows off Joe Sanderson’s lighting design.
For anyone yet to be convinced that Easter is a time for panto, this Cinderella might be the one to persuade you. Playing at the Theatre Royal until Easter Monday it’s the perfect family treat for the school holiday, and tickets are available here.
Star Rating 4 stars
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The cast of Cinderella - Picture by David Munn
This review was originally written for publication by Good News Liverpool
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