For the fourth year running, Paul Hendy and Emily Wood’s Evolution Productions has teamed up with York Theatre Royal’s Juliet Forster to present a family-oriented and feel-good take on a traditional Christmas panto.
Sticking closely to the conventional plot, Sario Solomon’s Aladdin (but you can call him Al) goes from rags to riches in his pursuit of Princess Jasmine (Emily Tang), aided and abetted by brother Charlie (Tommy Carmichael), despite the machinations of their uncle, the evil Ivan Tobebooed (Paul Hawkyard).
CBeebies presenter Evie Pickerill does double duty as the Spirits of the Ring and the Lamp. She brings charisma and charm, slotting in well with the rest of the (mostly new) cast and ensemble.
Two key players return here, and it’s a delight to see them united again. Robin Simpson has made the Dame role his own, bringing spontaneity and wit to the part without dragging it out (though at one point, as he was milking his moment, a child’s voice rang out from the audience: "say summat!").
And Paul Hawkyard returns in the villain role, as ever having an absolute blast as he works the audience. His scenes with Simpson are particularly enjoyable: Ivan attempts to seduce the Dame in order to get Aladdin to retrieve the lamp for him, and moments such as these highlight the great comic interplay between the two. Hawkyard’s big number, "I Predict a Riot", felt like it was still bedding in on the night I saw it, but should be a hoot once it’s more settled, complete with line-up of dancing mummies.
Aside from the pairing of Simpson and Hawkyard, the cast tend to offer likeable but straight-down-the-line takes on their roles. The one standout might be Rowan Armitt-Brewster, who steps out from the ensemble to become the Police Community Support Officer PC World. He riffs well off Carmichael, Solomon and Simpson, showing comic chops as well as acrobatic flexibility.
This year’s gag crop seemed to me serviceable rather than prime vintage. After a pretty strong start, a lot of them came across as more generic than in some years, with nothing especially topical or off-the-wall. Most of the puns were well-worn—obviously a given for most pantos, but it’s nice when the odd punchline creeps up on you rather than signalling its arrival from a mile away.
The comic standout is a sequence in which characters express their innermost thoughts by lipsynching to snippets of well-known pop songs. A pun-based routine roping in a long-suffering audience member wins the gong for ‘trippiest moment’: the ensemble appear one-by-one in a variety of finely crafted animal costumes which fall into the uncanny valley of human / animal hybrids, all in service of some tortuous punchlines. It felt like a fever dream to me, so I can only imagine what it was like for the hapless dad hauled onstage.
Emily Tang is another in the cast’s all-round charming performers. She sings beautifully, but unfortunately doesn’t have many opportunities to show it, and is in general given very little to do. Whereas some past York pantos have worked to redress the ‘drippy princess gets rescued’ narrative with some kick-ass action sequences for female leads, unfortunately Jasmine is barely there (though Tang’s performance is far from ‘drippy’).
Forster’s direction is pacy and fun, and the design is impressive, flexible and cartoony. I think all my reservations about this outing for Evolution hinge on the fact that the script feels a little ‘route one’. The Dame’s occupation this year is ‘joke-shop owner’, which makes for some incredible costumes. But it means that the script lays on the "I’m zany, me" lines a bit thick, while being not quite gag-stuffed enough to leave you rolling in the aisles.
As ever, though, this is solid family entertainment, more suited to younger school-age theatregoers, perhaps. There is a moment of real technical magic when Aladdin takes to his flying carpet: a truly impressive bit of stage trickery which Solomon sells well with a twinkle in his eye.