BEAUTY AND THE BEAST: Kenneth Alan Taylor: Nott Playhouse
BEAUTY AND THE BEAST: Kenneth Alan Taylor
Nottingham Playhouse: Tkts 0115 9419419
Runs: 2h 45m approx – depending on ad libs and encores: two intervals: till 18th Jan
Perfs 7.30, 2.30 matinee most days.
Review; Jen Mitchell: 30th November
A wonderful start to Christmas! Any pantomime that can keep a 37, 7 and a 4 year old enthralled for the best part of three hours has to be worth seeing.
What I really love about this production was that everybody on stage clearly enjoys themselves as much as the audience! I have never been disappointed by a Kenneth Alan Taylor pantomime before and this year is no exception.
The audience participation begins almost immediately with Kenneth Alan Taylor’s Fifi getting one of the dads up on stage – my sides were aching within minutes. This banter continues throughout with the actors stepping effortlessly in and out of character for ad libbed exchanges with the audience and each other.
The story of Beauty and the Beast draws heavily upon the traditional French fairy tale. Much is made of the French connection, it giving the opportunity for many ooh la la jokes and a smashing chorus scene inside the Moulin Rouge. I will never forget the sight of the door opening to reveal Fifi – a very bawdy pantomime dame – descending from the ceiling on a rope swing a la Nicole Kidman -the audience was in uproar. My own young children were positively shrieking with laughter.
Many of the cast have worked together in panto at the playhouse previously and have a huge rapport with the audience and with each other. Characters are welcomed on stage like old friends. All acting is confident and large in traditional pantomime style and the characters carry the story and the audience along with them. John Elkington's Jacques, Belle’s brother, is the clown/fool character and he carries it off beautifully with just the right amount of naivety to endear him entirely to the audience. Julia Harrison Jones is an enchanting Belle, every little girl's ideal of a fairy tale heroine. My four year old is still talking about her.
There is no 'baddy' in this production but we have the slimy Gaston, Florence and Vironique, the sisters who are more interested in shopping than anything else to act as foils to the 'good' characters.
The absolute star of the evening is Kenneth Alan Taylor as Madame Fifi Florizel. His dame leads the performance throughout, sometimes upstaging other characters but all in good humour and spirit. Very Frankie Howard with his double entendre, he keeps the adults amused all the way through. As my four year old put it, "Jacques was funny but Madame Fifi was the mostest funniest in the world".
Each change of costume by Fifi is greeted with wild applause and rightly so as they are breathtaking in their outrageousness, each one more fantastic than the last. They are literal interpretations of the action – when she returns to the castle she is wearing a little number covered in turrets, for a trip to Paris she wears a replica of the Eiffel Tower.
Jacques: John Elkington
Veronique: Rebecca Little
Florence: Karen Holmes
Madame Fifi Florizel: Kenneth Alan Taylor
Belle: Julia Harrison Jones
Gaston: Paul Gabriel
Maurice: Jeffrey Longmore
The Beast: Kevin McGowan
Phantoms: Karen Holmes, Rebecca Little, Paul Gabriel
Writer and Director: Kenneth Alan Taylor
Musical Director: John Morton
Choreographer: Adele Parry
Designer: Gary Underwood
Lighting Designer: Jason Taylor
Sound Designer: Paul Stear
Dance Captain: Rebecca Little
Guitars: Robbie Albery
Bass Guitars: Zoltan Dekany
Keyboards: John Morton
Percussion: Steve Smith
Chorus: Joanna Hickman, Hannah Keogh, Danielle Porter, Stephanie Ridge, Emma Clarke, Jasmine Barnes, Nicola Lakin, Rachael Thomas, Samantha M Simons, Catherine Vickers, Lois Perry, Amy Rowbottom, Nicola Kirkham, Hannah Hand, Katy Hautz, Hayley Hardie
Gendarmes: Holly Boyden, Tyne Harding, Shanice Miller, Solomon Miller
2002-12-02 14:53:29