Richmond Theatre’s annual Christmas pantomime never fails to please a diverse crowd of all ages and put a smile on everyone’s face with the festive fun. This year Richmond theatre created a magical performance of Cinderella with a humorous and uplifting delivery of the traditional fairytale. Like always it was filled with many laughs, boos and hisses with an inclusive range of jokes perfect for all the family.
Bespoke to this years Cinderella performance we had the wonderful treat of the special guest Anton Du Beke playing buttons who is a bubbly and energetic lead character that brought a spark of comedy to the stage. Anthony is more commonly for his professional dancing and judging on bbc’s celebrity strictly come dancing. With a television career of over a decade he is a family favourite and extremely experienced. He is recognisable in the entertainment world for his wittiness and distinguished character as well as his classic and timeless fashion choices. Along with Cinderella he newest upcoming appearance is him and his dance partner Erin’s 2022 showtime tour from Jan 28- March 30. Cinderella is his first panto and he told stage-chat, “ my first ever panto and I’m absolutely delighted to be buttons at the wonderful Richmond Theatre, see you there my loves!”. But if you didn’t get a chance to see Anton in Cinderella this year keep an eye out for tour.
This year Cinderella is showing from Friday 3rd December till Sunday 2nd January at the Richmond Upon Thames impressive and historic theatre which has previously hosted a range of quality shows and award winning musicals. The cast this year was filled with such excitement and passion with Oonagh Cox as cinders, David dale and Bobby Delaney as the ugly sisters, Rosemary Ashe as fairy godmother and Edward Chitticks as the Prince Charming.
Personally my favourite part of the performance with the clever mashup of songs features a range of songs to please the whole audience this scene featured the ugly sisters and buttons as all three contributed to humours and witty delivery. I also thoroughly enjoyed the dance element of the panto as it really brought an energy to stage that uplifted the whole performance. Overall this was an extremely thrilling, entertaining and comedic panto the audience could really feel the passion of the cast and their excitement to back on stage. After the messy year of closed theatres they’ve experienced it made it a really enjoyable experience for both cast and audience as they shared the joy to be back together!
