The Sleeping Beauty
★★★★☆ Great entertainment
Church Hill Theatre: Fri 13 – Sun 22 Dec 2024
Review by Hugh Simpson
The Sleeping Beauty, from Edinburgh People’s Theatre at the Church Hill, is everything you could want from a traditional pantomime.
Off-the-shelf pantos, such as this version by Ben Crocker, are keen to give the purchasing company their money’s worth. The result can often be meandering and overlong with too many extraneous characters and unnecessary sub-plots. This, however, is a taut affair, devoting much of its runtime to telling the traditional story, and is all over before 9.30. Which is exactly how a family panto should be.
A scene from EPT’s The Sleeping Beauty. Pic: Graham Bell.
Certainly, there are enough traditional elements to keep anyone happy. Plenty of local and topical references are included; audience participation includes a song-sheet, and even the very back rows are in with a chance of catching a sweetie. They even still have that rarest of things, a genuine Principal Boy.
Mandy Black’s direction ensures a pacy and involving production, making good use of the whole auditorium and the large cast. Anne Mackenzie’s musical direction gets full value from the ‘band’ consisting entirely of Ben Collins on keyboards and Duncan Clark on drums. The two of them certainly fill the auditorium, with the songs well chosen, deftly rewritten and never outstaying their welcome.
classic Dame
The sharing out of the action among the various characters means that the comedy roles have slightly less time on stage than they might. However, everyone here has considerable impact. Derek Ward’s Queen Dorothy is a classic Dame – exaggerated without being too grotesque, interacting with the audience without being remotely ingratiating. Gordon Braidwood’s King Nollikins and Al Brown’s Billy are similarly well judged, ludicrous but not completely ridiculous. Kelly Edie’s Kitty, silent apart from the odd ‘meow’, is excellent.
A scene from EPT’s The Sleeping Beauty. Pic: Graham Bell.
Kitty has an evil counterpart in Spindleshanks, who despite also being a cat can apparently talk perfectly well. James Sutherland manages to be both menacing and humorous as sidekick to the bad fairy Carabosse, who is played authoritatively by Lyzzie Dell. Once again, there is just the right level of nastiness without being too scary for the youngest audience members.
Anne Mackenzie provides the ideal contrast as the good Fairy Peaceful, with Gemma Dutton and Poppy Moore providing suitable support as Fairy Beautiful and Fairy Thoughtful.
Lynsey Spence’s Princess Aurora has more agency than is often the case, with her romance with Carol Bryce’s splendid, thigh-slapping Prince Orlando touchingly believable. However, this does lead to a problem with Orlando’s later return being explained as his being the great-great-grandson of the original; as Fairy Peaceful points out, ‘best not to go there’.
spirited
The chorus are extremely good, with tuneful singing and some spirited dance numbers, choreographed very well by Black. Robert Fuller’s lighting is highly effective, Olaf van Dijke and Peter Horsfall’s sound is notably strong, with audibility in the chorus numbers much better than is often the case at the Church Hill. Carol Caldwell’s work on wardrobe also deserves special mention.
A scene from EPT’s The Sleeping Beauty. Pic: Graham Bell.
Not everything works. Some of the cheesier jokes and routines are almost thrown away; they need to be sold more, and given a bit more zing, to have the requisite impact. When it does work, however, it does so beautifully, notably in a ‘behind you’ routine that has just the right amount of emphasis, and goes on long enough, to have the desired effect.
simply wonderful
This segment is part of a dream/nightmare sequence that could be irritating, but instead is simply wonderful; you just go with it, even up to Elvis Presley being chased right to the back of the Church Hill by a giant spider.
It is this combination of the traditional and the ridiculous that makes this production such a success. While some bigger budget pantos try to impress you with flashy effects, this is more accessible, and much more fun.
Running time: Two hours and 20 minutes (including one interval)
Church Hill Theatre, 30 Morningside Rd, EH10 4DR
Friday 13 – Sunday 22 December 2024
Tues-Fri at 7.00 pm; Sat and Sun at 2.30 pm
Tickets and details: Book here.
Website: https://ept.org.uk
Facebook: @EdinburghPeoplesTheatre
Instagram: @epeoplestheatre
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The full cast of EPT’s The Sleeping Beauty. Pic: Graham Bell.
ENDS
We went on Saturday afternoons – it was brilliant – as good, if not better, than pantos I’ve seen at big city theatres. Absolutely LOVED it – well done to all involved – especially my Wee brother who was in the chorus !! (Bit of bias there I know!) Bit seriously – a brilliant job done by everyone !