I suspect the Richmond panto is a tradition for most families that attend – it was for mine for many years. It’s sad, then, that corners seem to have been cut, and all we have this year is a watered-down version of last year’s ‘Cinderella’ success. The realisation that we’d seen/heard this all quite recently was almost palpable as it rapidly spread through the audience.
Chris Jarvis, of CBeebies fame, here as both director and Chester the Jester, clearly believes he has a template for a successful panto, but too often gives the impression of an old pro doing it by numbers. Matt Rixon, so good last year with dad Matthew Kelly, ably assists as Nursie, but this really is a two-man show amongst a lot of wood and both have to be work furiously hard to get anything out of the gallery.
There are high points of course, not least the ‘Twelve Days of Christmas’ at the beginning of the second half. It surely will get better as the run continues, but Maureen Lipman as the evil Carabosse looked like a rabbit caught in headlights, struggling to overcome the sudden unexpected silences, and the night we were there they weren’t even a tough crowd