It's a Holly, Jolly Panto Christmas (oh yes it is)

 

'Mirror, mirror on the wall' (except I was in a wardrobe...).

Playing the Mirror (centre) in 'Snow White' in 2014

 For this next post, I’ll be focusing on the festive season, which has always been my absolute favourite time of year, I just love everything about it. As I just can’t get enough of anything Christmassy this time of year (and throughout the rest of the year, tbh), we usually try to go the theatre around Christmas. Obviously that can’t happen in quite the same way this year, but it’ll still be the most beautiful time of year, whatever happens. 

 One particular form of entertainment around Christmastime here is the pantomime (oh no, it isn’t etc), which even links back to my very first post on this blog back in July, when I mentioned my first visit to a live theatrical event (and a somewhat upsetting incident as a toddler when my fear of the panto villain in a local Forfar production meant my removal from the building…). In fact, let’s just move on, shall we?

 With the Montrose theatre group, Song Shop, I was involved in putting on pantomimes every Christmas from 2010 till 2016 (programmes above). The first one we ever did was ‘Cinderella’ and, aged 10, I took a turn at being one of the mice (amongst other things, villager etc.). And Cinders was so nice, we did it twice, as we put on ‘Cinderella’ again in 2016, this time I got to wear some rather comically large wigs for the ball scene (backstage picture below). Yes, I look ridiculous but that’s panto, right?

 It may be a cliché but ‘Cinderella’ is probably my favourite panto and it remains mostly a classic and much referenced story. All the pantos were really fun to be in, however (even with some arguably poorly judged and dated references). Also, the fact that we performed them so close to Christmas meant that I felt that there was an added excitement, fun and joy in the air that you didn’t get from doing shows at any other time of year. We always ended the show with a big Christmas tune (usually ‘Rockin’ around the Christmas Tree’) and I literally couldn’t have been happier… (a ‘Parks and Rec’ Chris Traeger and ‘Wicked’ reference there…).

 I was never a lead in any of the pantos or shows, which I was fine with, as I loved being in the group numbers and I wasn’t confident enough to sing several solos or memorise lots of dialogue so I never auditioned for any of those parts (I’m also a tad lazy but didn’t tend to state that as an obvious reason at the time). However, for ‘Snow White’, our Christmas panto in 2014, aged fourteen, I played the magic mirror and had a lot of fun doing it, even if it was only for a few scenes (photo at the top of this post). I felt very lucky and surprised to get the role (which had a few pages of dialogue), as things like this can mean a lot at that time of life. It certainly was a memorable experience and I don’t think I’ll ever forget the feeling of being quite literally wheeled onto the stage in a large box by a fellow castmate, while wearing various sparkly, silver outfits. 

 The mirror costumes weren’t the only silver attire I wore in that show but they were, surprisingly, at the more glamourous end of my wardrobe that year. For the number where we pretended to be toys that had come to life, some of the other teenage girls were ballerinas in pink tutus and I was one of the robots in a silver suit where you couldn’t even tell who I was (any ‘Community’ fans getting Christmas season two stop motion Annie and Britta vibes?). Looking back, I feel silly for even being bothered, but at the time, a part of me did long to be one those chosen to wear the coveted pretty tutu. Daft as it sounds, the costumes reflected a bit how I saw myself compared with my female peers at the time, and more recently, as I’ve never really experienced the feeling of fitting in or being what could be called ‘popular’ or sociable and I didn’t always feel like I truly belonged, especially back then (this was  before the diagnosis of my Turner Syndrome, written about here, and we were still waiting to find out if there was a reason why I was growing slower etc.). 

 The fact that we didn’t really have a dance routine for the robot section, other than, you know, the robot, was OK with me as I have taken many dance classes over the years but it’s always been hard-going (I love dancing but I don’t find it easy – spatial issues and a resulting self-consciousness are common features of TS). From ballet as a tot (I say ‘ballet’ – running around in a tutu), to Irish, to the secondary organised mob dances of the Rock Challenge competitions, to a few ballroom classes as a teenager – I have certainly tried a few styles. 

 I’ve been fortunate enough to see some great pantos, in Arbroath, Aberdeen, Dundee and Leeds. In fact, the ‘Cinderella: A Rock and Roll Panto’ we saw in 2012 in Leeds at the famous City Varieties venue (programme above) is still one of the finest pantos I think we’ve ever seen and probably one of the best shows, in all honesty. It’s certainly one of the only shows we’ve seen with a double meaning for the ball, as in a dance, and large, bouncy balls that were thrown, or yeeted, if that’s still a thing, into the audience. One of the great things about this Leeds professional show (and they put one on every year) was that the small cast was on stage all the time – taking on several roles each and making up the live band that played throughout. So impressive! It was also, despite the older rock’n’roll music, a modern take on panto with far fewer cringey jokes. The same can be said of pantos I have seen done by students at uni (Lip Theatre at University of Dundee) where the jokes are new and a lot of effort goes into making panto a more up-to-date venture.

 As this is the last post before Christmas, I wanted to wish everyone a merry Christmas and thank everyone who’s read any of these slightly rambling blogs over the last five months. Christmas is and always will be such a special time of year and my absolute favourite season. I love everything that it represents about kindness, generosity and making time for the people who are closest to you, so I hope that even after the strangeness of 2020, we all have a wonderful Christmastime. Also, a reminder to anyone who’s had a particularly rough time of it during 2020 lockdowns, that you’re never alone, things will get better and it won’t last forever. 

Merry Christmas, hope you all enjoy the most beautiful time of the year.

Happy Holidays.

Cinderella programmes from Dundee, Arbroath, Leeds and Montrose