ALADDIN. To 17 January.
Kirkcaldy
ALADDIN
by Alan McHugh
Adam Smith Theatre To 17 January 2004
Mon-Sat 7pm except 15 January 7.30pm Mat 29-31 December, 3,7,10,17 January 2pm 2pm no evening performance 31 December, no performance 1 January
Audio-described at any performance if 48 hours' notice is given
BSL Signed 13 January
All seats £5.50 5,8,12 January
Party Night (Leave the kids at home') 7.30pm 15 January
Runs 2hr 30min One interval
TICKETS: 01592 412929
Review: Timothy Ramsden 23 December
Trad. Panto fun honestly done with high audience involvement and a superb dame.Alan McHugh has clearly established himself as Kirkcaldy's Dame of choice. Give him another 2 decades and he'll be as much an institution as Berwick Kaler in York. McHugh may not (yet) go for Kaler-style all-out mayhem, but he commands stage and audience beautifully. He has pace and energises each scene with a true Dame-like assurance. The idea anyone may not want her around, or giving her views, would never occur to the likes of Widow Twankey. So, that's all right then.
But so's the whole cast. Claire Knight's Susi Sushi (culturally aware this genre isn't) may be saddled with some suspiciously fishy dialogue but her bright energy in connecting with all her pals' in the audience immediately has them on her side. Just as enthusiastic, at the opposite pole, is Adrian Beaumont's darkly evil Abenazar, who bores us stiff with some opening guff about the lamp's magic powers it might be some lump of Wagnerian Rhinegold the way he goes on about it. But once he's chucked off his storyteller disguise, we recognise him for what he is, the kind of power-crazed villain who soaks up out boos and hisses (plentiful enough to drench him before the evening's out).
Amid these forceful types, Alastair Bruce skilfully contrasts his sublimely reticent Aladdin. Besotted with the beautifully vacuous Princess Pekinesia, once his genie-brought wealth puts him in her material league he stays blind to her selfish disregard for him as he is to the true love blowing in the Sushi wind. Amy Fraser's frank stupidity and greed almost become loveable. Her snorting laugh's picked up by Twankey, Susi and others for delightful, deserved mockery. One of society's fashion accessories herself, Pekinesia turns goodish in the end.
Her pretentiousness is finely set off by Antony Strachan's beefily disgruntled Genie, a tattooed heavyweight who's nobody's fool and only takes orders from the proper authority. Add Stephen Crane's underling, a trio of capable dancers and a cache of youngsters who clearly know what they're doing and it's more happy New Year nights ahead in Kirkcaldy.
Abanazar: Adrian Beaumont
Susi Sushi: Claire Knight
Aladdin: Alastair Bruce
Princess Pekinesia: Amy Fraser
Hi-He-Jin: Stephen Crane
Widow Twankey: Alan McHugh
Genie: Antony Strachan
Dancers: Lyndsay Jameson, Katiejane Derbyshire, Laura Williams
The Chinese Crackers: Sacha Neville, Amy Elder, Jade Stewart, Jodie MacDonald, Laura Elder, Emma Urquhart/
The Chinese Whispers: Rosie Goodsir, Brogan Auld, Chloe Simson, Kathleen Shields, Jody McCullough, Kerry Gibson
Director: Jonathan Stone
Designer: Mark Walters
Lighting: Andy Hotchkiss
Sound: Paul Robertson
Musical Director: Andrew Thomson
Choreographer: Val Jones
Costumes: Lynn Buys
2003-12-29 12:53:10