JACK AND THE BEANSTALK
New Wimbledon Theatre, London SW19
Seen
15 December, 2017
***

Wimbledon has in recent years presented the glitziest London pantomime outside the West End, and the least enjoyable; implausible international casting like David Hasselhoff as Captain Hook has seldom sent quality skyrocketing. This year, though, the theatre has switched panto production outfits, and the whole feel of the show has correspondingly altered.

Like London’s other Jack And The Beanstalk at Hammersmith, the cast boasts a mere six principals plus ensemble. Here, though, two of those six are comedian Al Murray, effectively playing his Pub Landlord persona in panto costume, and Clive Rowe, who over a decade or so in Hackney Empire’s pantos has become one of the finest dames in the business. Irrepressible, unashamed to wear the most ridiculous drag (his Wonder Woman here is a spectacle for the ages) and boasting a top-notch powerful singing voice, Rowe can pretty much make a show on his own.

So it’s a puzzle why, when Wimbledon has successfully enticed him across the city, it then often relegates him to a mere feed for Murray. The latter works the audience with mastery and is likewise unstoppable (I’m fairly sure the onstage giggles were genuine and unscripted), but there’s simply too much of him here. I don’t mean the quality palls, but giving maybe half the total playing time to a dramatically tangential character unbalances the show. However light, skilled and all-round playful Thom Southerland’s direction is, he’s left with only so much time to tell the actual story. There’s no messy “slosh” routine, no “ghost” sequence (it’s replaced by a 3D episode, which at least doesn’t put the actual, real-live three-dimensional actors on hold but has them interacting with the CGI) and the downfall of Giant Blunderbore and his onstage avatar the wicked Baron Fleshcreep is reduced to an afterthought.

Barry Robinson sources his score principally from golden-age Motown (although a number that’s basically about sexual assault, with Stevie Wonder’s “Superstition” rewritten as “Super Kissin’”, probably deserves second thoughts just now), and it’s all a hoot (if an efficient hoot) for the grown-ups. However, and most seriously, the kid-friendly material all too frequently feels like ballast rather than one of the central planks of the panto structure.

Written for the Financial Times.

Copyright © Ian Shuttleworth; all rights reserved.

Return to index of reviews for the year 2017

Return to master reviews index

Return to main theatre page

Return to Shutters homepage