PANTOMIME REVIEW: Aladdin - The Opera House, Manchester.

Crossroads Pantomimes are responsible for the colourful, upbeat spectacle that is 'Aladdin', now playing at Manchester's Opera House. Billed as a traditional family pantomime, with a large banner under the title proclaiming "Everything you could ever wish for in a panto", expectations were not only high, but with that kind of marketing, one expects it to be the best panto ever produced. Well, the company certainly threw everything at the show (well, almost everything), to try and deliver on that promise, but sadly it fell short, very short, on many counts.

We find ourselves in the fair city of Mancunia (and lots of topical covid and political jokes abounded at the start), and as Scheherazade appeared from a trap door at the front of the stage and the dancers gave us a colourful and upbeat spectacle of a song and dance, the augers were good. Sadly it went downhill from there on in. There was a lot of line fluffing this evening (whether deliberate or otherwise), and as funny as that can be, and is; and we expect such things in panto, it's all part and parcel of the fun of the show; it just worries me that if that trend continues, by the end of the run, there might not be any panto other than ad-libs.

Directed by Jonathan Kiley, the emphasis was clearly on fun, effects, colour, and jokes, at the expense sadly of actually getting round to the business of telling a clear and followable narrative (without missing chunks out or simply expecting the audience to already have a pre-knowledge). We were also missing much of what a traditional pantomime features. The traditional banter between audience and cast was almost lost. Wishee-Washee and the Dame both had their entrance calls and responses, but I counted only ONE "yes it is / no it isn't", and never once did we have a "behind you". The children were mostly ignored - I understand the difficulty of the staging and the audience in this theatre, but even so, I have seen cast members mingling with the stalls audience before in shows and so know it is possible. And as for traditional pantomime set pieces, then three were executed, and only one of them truly worked. The DVDs routine was too long-winded, thus losing the catchiness of the initial joke. 

Plenty of lighting changes, colours, and SFX throughout to keep us stimulated, but when we see action being performed in front of the entrance to the cave BEFORE 'The Entrance To The Cave' scene (yes I know it's in the programme, but it didn't really make sense), and then once inside the cave, we saw no jewels, no nothing, in fact, the whole scene where traditionally there is a scary dance (usually with UV lighting) had been cut. We also had to contend with follow spots which were not following the actors and casting shadows,whilst blackouts to change scenes came in a second too early every time, all this does tend to diminish the effectiveness of these creative ideas. 

Alexandra Burke played Scheherezade, and proved to be more than suitable for the role, interacting with the more OTT members of the cast nicely. Was she given so many solo ballads because she was the only one able to sing them? Ben Nickless worked his socks off and more as Wishee-Washee. With what he was given he tried his best to deliver, and although some of the jokes didn't land, he was an extremely personable and committed member of the cast. I am not at all certain why a drag artiste was cast as Widow Twankey. Ceri Dupree is already an act in his own right, and the skills and genre of performance necessary for drag artistry is not, in any way, the same as those of being a panto dame. He served little or no purpose in this story, and seemed concerned only on getting "likes" for how faaaaaaabulous he looked!

The Genie of the Lamp was a large puppet, man-handled by stage crew from the wings, which looked on the top half, like the Disney film genie (blue), and the bottom half was scraggy and left unfinished. 

I'm sure none of the children watching this were any the wiser though on my adult critical findings above, and they were cheering and booing as loud as they could, the obvious barrier between stage and audience notwithstanding. But as pantomimes go, and I have seen (and reviewed)  more than I care to remember over the years, this was bright, colourful, fun, and a spectacle; and at least it was definitely family friendly (unlike some pantos that have come to the Opera House in previous years!).

Reviewer - Matthew Dougall
on - 14.12.21