Review: SLEEPING BEAUTY, Salisbury Playhouse
Photo credit: Pamela Raith
The Wiltshire Creative annual pantomime at Salisbury Playhouse has built a strong reputation for fresh original takes on familiar titles and for the last three years, Plested, Brown and Wilsher have written the scripts to give their shows a unique quirky feel. This year’s Sleeping Beauty is no exception.
The organisation’s amazing workshops have again produced another fabulous set (designed by Katie Lias) and range of costumes that place the action in the fashion centre of Europe, Salisbury-shire, where they produce the latest trend setting styles on sewing machines until Fairy Badflix curses Princess Stella on her christening day to die by her 21st birthday by the prick of one of their needles. As with last year’s script for Dick Whittington which spun the story around social media and computer games, this year’s tale is centred around the evil of a life obsessed by TV in another strong targeted message at the youthful audience. At its heart it remains, as pantomime should be, a story of good versus evil and of love and friendship overcoming the villain.
There are many delightful design features that elevate the production. The first appearance of Princess Stella, played by Lottie Mae O’Kelly as a baby face in the pram, is a lovely, cute comic scene as the others interact with her. The wonderful quick changes as Stella grows up and approaches her 21st birthday are executed with great speed and charm. The Bake-Off icing machine assisted by a member of the audience is a fresh take on the traditional slosh scene. The coffee obsessed Fairy Frappuccino, played by Claudia Kariuki, bounces around the stage fuelled by the energy from seven expressos in a reminder to not overindulge in the drink! No pantomime would be complete without a Ghost scene and Salisbury delvers with another nod to the kids in the audience with a Lego man chasing the cast off the stage.
There is plenty of simple magic too from Mike the Magnificent, played by Joseph Peacock, the superhero friend to the Princess. The addition of simple tricks add something special to pantomime and there is great charm in the delivery of a succession of tricks including the rope trick, false hand and a cod teleportation illusion. When Dame Nanny Fanny, played by Scotty Armstrong, enters dressed as Mary Poppins and carrying a carpet bag, they miss the chance for more illusion as she takes things out of the bag. She introduces some gentle innuendo for the adults with a call back of “Nice to see you, Fanny.”
The music selection by Paul Herbert is less strong or familiar than in previous years but the fresh wording to ‘Flash Bang Wallop’ certainly worked well at the christening, ‘Could It Be Magic’ between Mike and Stella is fun, ‘Search For A Hero’ as they seek the perfect Prince introduces a nice twist, ‘Sweet Dreams’ for BadFlix, and ‘Enough is Enough’ for the Fairy sisters are among the standout moments.
The creative team seem to have miss the opportunity for some witty video on the Giant AV screen that BadFlix sits in front of, leaving us looking at a test card and the pumping of bubbles into the audiences, which creates a massive distraction to the young audience who then ignore what is happening on stage! The general level of comedy writing is weaker than expected and at times, the pace is slow, leading to a running time including interval of over two and half hours. Some judicious cuts could be made and no doubt it will naturally speed up as the sixty show run proceeds.
Yet overall, once again, Salisbury Playhouse delivers a very good looking, fresh feeling, energetically performed and upbeat pantomime that delights the young audience, and has just enough in it to satisfy the adults there too. They know how to make these shows here and we have no doubt that it will be another successful run that sets the venue up for a good 2025 where its community and outreach work and the Salisbury Festival connects it wonderfully to its local audience.
*** Three stars
Reviewed by: Nick Wayne
Sleeping Beauty plays at Salisbury Playhouse until 12 January 2025, with further info here.