PANTOMIME REVIEW: Dick Whittington And His Amazing Cat - Contact Theatre, Manchester.

Eight Freestyle pantos have been a Manchester institution for some time, normally performing at The Dancehouse Theatre further up Oxford Road; however, due to the temporary closure of the Dancehouse, the company have made contact with Contact coming into contact with Contact Theatre! (sorry, I should maybe leave the jokes for the panto writers!)

I have been fortunate enough to have witnessed most of this company's shows over the years, and many of the cast return year after year. The pantomimes are always high enegry, up-beat, and traditional, and always feature lots of modern songs and dance routines performed by a troupe of both older dancers [in this case a team of four: Ellie Owen, Courtney Gibbons, Shannon Webb, and Holli Hadfield] and children from a local dancing academy. I am struggling to find any reference to which dancing school they belong to - it doesn't seem to be on the programme anywhere - but I can say that this afternoon it was the turn of Team Rat, and they were amazing: breakdancing, body-popping, hip-hopping, and leaping gymnastically and skilfully throughout. 

The story of Dick Whittington is the one we all know and love, and the pantomime uses this as the basis for a few standard routines, many corny and down-right-silly jokes, a few over-the-heads-of-the-children jokes, and some great costumes and contemporary political snides. King Rat (Adam Urey) was suitably evil, but not too scary, entering stage left; whilst entering stage right was Fairy Bow-Belles (Kate Mitchell) and they banter in rhyme. Marcquelle Ward was a very personable and likeable Dick, whilst his all-talking, -singing, -dancing, and even -breakdancing cat, Scratch, played by Anton Phung, simply stole the show every time he showed us his moves! Idle Jack was played by one of the company's regulars, Red Redmond, recreating the character from previous pantos. Jack's mother, Dame Freda the Cook, was performed by Freda Chattington with his dulcet Stockport tones and butchness his trademark, making for a rather forthright and comedic characterisation. Steven Jackson was a very aimiable if somewhat hapless Captain Fitzwarren (his funniest moments were when genuinely losing his place in the script and ad-libbing), and his daughter was the truly suitably beautiful Rebecca Crookson (Alice Fitzwarren). 

All had good stage presence, were correctly cast and showed great ability at wooing, wowing, clapping and even booing the audience of youngsters into a frenzy. With the emphasis firmly on fun and entertainment, this panto was hard to fault; although I would have liked to have heard the traditional responses between audience and cast at least once. Neither "yes it is / no it isn't" nor " behind you" featured in this show, despite the audience prompting it on two occasions. Shame, the cast should simply have rolled with it if the audience were wanting it!

An on-stage band of four (Mark Griffiths, Charlie Rachael-Kay, Matt Hill, and Matthew Corrigan) worked well with the cast, even changing costumes half-way through. Sound levels were not too loud, and the technical aspects of the show generally worked very well. Where it fell down somewhat was in the lighting in front of the tabs. When the tab came in and the cast were required to act on what is traditionally called the apron front, the lighting here was insufficient, casting strange shadows on their faces, some in semi or total darkness. King Rat's green light was insufficient to light him, as indeed was the fairy's single light when she had a solo stage right. 

All-in-all, a hugely entertaining, high energy, fun panto; traditional, family-friendly, and proficiently produced. Oh yes it is...!

A final note: The extra-large programme which is made to look like a newspaper (nice idea) is issue NUMBER 9!! - Thank you!! xx

Reviewer - Matthew Dougall
on - 12,12,21