A gold star panto full of bear-faced cheek!
Panto season sees Goldilocks and the Three Bears open at Darlington Hippodrome. We sent our own Goldilocks – nine-year-old CHLOË – and Daddy Bear CHRIS BARRON along to see if this show was just right, or unBEARable…
I love panto. Growing up in Darlington in the 90s, Christmas often meant a visit to Darlington Hippodrome (or Darlington Civic Theatre as it was back then).
I’ve been diligently carrying on the tradition with my own daughter. Chloë is getting a bit older now and starting to roll her eyes at many of our family Christmas traditions, so I was relieved when she eagerly agreed to accompany me to Goldilocks and the Three Bears.
You really can’t knock Darlington Hippodrome’s confidence. As we took our seats, the circus-themed stage curtain proclaimed us to be in for “The Greatest Show on Earth”.
This raised my eyebrows – big talk in the Big Top. Chloë also took issue with the claim.
“But Wicked is the greatest show on Earth, isn’t it Dad?” she said indignantly. “That’s false advertising!”
Nevertheless, things started off well with the opening number, which – in the best traditions of panto – nicked the tune from another song and added fresh lyrics.
We are then introduced to Baron Von Bolshoi, the Evil Ringmaster of the Circus of Nightmares, played by this year’s big guest star, Strictly Come Dancing pro, Brendan Cole.
And Cole, fittingly for a professional dancer, doesn’t put a foot wrong. There’s no room for subtlety in panto, and I’m happy to report that Cole throws everything at the wall to make Baron Von Bolshoi an uproariously loathsome baddie.
At one point he’s described as “an evil, twisted man who loves to inflict pain on others”, which is predictably mistaken for a description of Sir Keir Starmer.
He approaches the role with undisguised glee at getting to be evil – just as a panto villain should. I can only describe his performance as a strange mix of Dick Dastardly, Simon Cowell, and Julian Clary.
His circus rival is Panto Dame Betty Barnum, played magnificently by Jamie Jones, one of the two returning players from previous years’ pantos.
As the Ringmistress of The Greatest Show on Earth, Jones seemed to have a lot more to do this year compared to his previous two Darlington appearances.
He delivers the innuendo-filled gags with a fantastic sense of comic timing. Strutting onto the stage in yet another improbably-proportioned costume, Jones brought the house down by declaring: “I had to wear my Catholic bra today – it holds masses!”
His partner-in-crime is once again the indefatigable Josh Benson, also returning to Darlington for his third year.
Exploding on with his now-legendary energy, Benson announces “’Ey up gang, my name’s Joey… this year. So when you see me, shout “’Ey Up Joey!”
I’m pretty sure I shouted out “Muddles!” or “Buttons!” – his names in previous shows – by mistake a couple of times, such a fixture of the Darlington panto scene has Benson become.
I suspect this man may be ideologically opposed to doing something so boring as simply walking across the stage. Instead, he charges, bounces, leaps, rolls, and in one memorable feat, attempts to tightrope-walk over the boards.
The heroic trio is rounded out by Taziva-Faye Katsande as Goldilocks, who handles everything thrown at her with ease, bouncing well off the larger personalities of Jones and Benson.
A panto really lives or dies on the chemistry between its cast, but held together by Benson, the main players appear to be making each other laugh just as much as the children watching.
“Hey, it’s really you, isn’t it? Off Strictly?” asks Benson as Cole walks on for the first time. “I’m such a big fan! Look everyone, I can’t believe we got Anton Du Beke!”
It’s never wise to wind-up a celebrity holding a bullwhip, Josh.
Of course, it would be a terrible waste to bring in a dancer with Cole’s reputation and not let him strut his stuff, and I can reassure Strictly fans that he is given ample opportunity to cut a rug.
Most might prefer the impressive mambo he leads towards the end of the show, but I’m a simple man, and much preferred his slapstick dance battle against Benson.
“I can’t dance now,” protests Benson, “I’m constipated! I couldn’t even Paso Doble!”
And yes, the Three Bears are in this – though I often found myself forgetting they were.
It’s not that anyone puts in a bad performance, it’s just that they – along with whatever passes for plot in panto – is overshadowed by the rest of the cast, and the show is so stuffed full of gags and set-pieces that the bears get a little lost in the melee.
They introduce themselves as ‘Darlo Bears’, complete with what I think were meant to be Darlington accents, but which mostly veered between Geordie and a thick Yorkshire twang that wouldn’t be out of place in Last of the Summer Wine.
At the interval, between mouthfuls of ice-cream, Chloë remarked: “There’s been quite a lot of jokes, I notice.”
She wasn’t wrong. The gags don’t stop coming. Yes, they’re about the standard panto quality, but even the bad ones made us groan appreciatively, and there were a couple I jotted down to use at a later date.
There’s even a couple of amusing name-drops for the panto sponsors: BHP Law and Babul’s, which have both helped make the panto happen.
Appropriately for The Greatest Show on Earth, audiences can count on seeing singing, dancing, zebras, giraffes, elephants, and juggling before the final curtain falls.
The juggling is courtesy of El Mariachi Marquez – better known as Gordon Marquez, scion of a long-running circus family, and a man who put me in mind of a juggling Jason Momoa.
Marquez is given his own chance to shine early in the second half – a choice that Benson must have been grateful for, given it mostly falls to him to cover for long costume and set changes.
Marquez juggles clubs, balls, and hats with apparent nonchalance – standard stuff, you may think, but at one point he’s doing it without using his hands!
Which brings us to what was surprisingly my favourite part of the show.
I admit I groaned when the familiar melody of The 12 Days of Christmas struck up. We’ve all seen this hackneyed routine in more pantomimes than we care to remember, and it always drags on too long and sends the energy in the room crashing through the floor.
Or so I thought.
The four principals’ rendition was cut short when the “FIVE! JUGGLING! BALLS!” were ‘accidentally’ hurled into the audience.
Cue “I need you to grab my balls!” from the Dame, which resulted in Cole hurling himself into the howling audience, hauling himself over seats, down aisles, and even across laps – much to a few mums’ titillation, I’m sure.
The routine continued in the same frenzied disorder, ultimately resulting in severe damage to stage equipment, an explosion, a burnt toy Willy, and one cast member tearing open their trousers in what Chloë insists was an unscripted mishap.
And speaking of unscripted, the other highlight was definitely Benson’s vignette with three children pulled up from the audience: Seth, Talula, and Benjamin.
Benson announced they would help him sing Old MacDonald Had a Farm, and asked each what animal they would be.
“A capybara!” announced five-year-old Benjamin, much to Chloë’s delight.
“A capybara, hey?” asked Benson. “And what sound do they make?”
Benjamin didn’t know.
“Do you want to pick another animal?”
Benjamin did.
A similar thing happened with Seth, but at eight-years-old, he was a much tougher customer, and stuck to his guns, despite not being certain what noise a “shark” would make on a farm.
“I don’t know what’s going to happen now,” warned Benson as the music reached the crescendo when the shark would be required to vocalise.
To his credit, Seth’s impromptu acapella rendition of the Jaws theme had the audience in stitches, and the band were quick to join in. It was pure, unscripted chaos, made hysterical by Benson’s charisma and careful handling.
Goldilocks and the Three Bears has everything a great panto should – great performances, a likeable cast, and plenty of jokes that run the gamut from bad to merely bad taste.
Chloë declared it “the funniest one yet”, and judging by the audience reaction, she wasn’t alone.
The Greatest Show on Earth might be going a bit far. But definitely the greatest show we’ve seen in a while. Since Wicked, I guess.
- Goldilocks and the Three Bears is running at Darlington Hippodrome until Wednesday 31 December. Tickets are available from https://www.darlingtonhippodrome.co.uk/