Celebrating Christmas on Stage

Kelly Craig

As we approach the festive season, most of us will be getting our tinsel, sequins and sparkle on to visit the theatre. Panto is more than a festive treat, it’s a ritual for many families and an introduction to the magic of the stage for lots of our young people. It can open minds and inspire our younger generation into the world of acting, dance and music. For a lot of children, a panto visit is their first time in the theatre, and this traditionally British phenomenon can be the initial spark for many a career in the arts.

You never forget your first panto. The lights, the music, the colourful gaiety of the characters and the buoyancy of the audience. And of course, the villain, the dark woods and the ghost (there’s always a ghost!). The amalgamation of joy and fear in one show delivers excitement every time. My first panto was The Ugly Duckling at the Magnum Theatre in Irvine in 1985. It starred a young, unknown Alan Cumming and was produced by Borderline Theatre. In a bizarre twist of fate, I’m now renovating the theatre that was their headquarters back then, to restore it to its former glory.

In the years that followed I was mesmerised by Cinderella, Mother Goose and Dick Whittington at The Gaiety – starring Ayr’s own Sydney Devine and panto stalwart Johhny Beattie – and heartbroken to meet Orville backstage only to find him stuffed into a carrier bag hanging by Keith Harris’s side on his way to the pub. I never credit panto as the nascence of my creative desires, it was The Big Picnic, a WWI site specific drama in a Govan shipyard that inspired the drama student in me, but I’m sure that panto planted a seed all those years ago.

This year, I’ve written my own. After 20 years of writing mostly straight drama for stage and screen, I’ve taken the plunge and I’m in rehearsal for the ‘oh no it isnt’s’ with a group of adults with learning disabilities at South Ayrshire’s Arrol Park. Together we’ve devised an adaptation of Cinderella and I’m loving the adventure into sparkly comedy with this fabulously talented group. When the curtain goes down on it, I’ll treasure the joy it’s brought my way and I’ll be taking myself off to see a traditional Scottish panto. Last Christmas I traded Rapunzel for The Rockettes’ Christmas Spectacular on a festive visit to New York, which was incredible. The full nativity scene with real animals on stage was a highlight, and the Toy Soldier routine was perfection, but nobody says it’s Christmas like the Scottish panto dame!