AD | Tickets Gifted in exchange of an honest review.
TW: This show will contain haze, smoke and special effects.
The classical Grimm brothers fairy tale, Snow White, follows the story of the Princess who embarks on her journey to find true love with the Prince, far away from the Wicked Queen.
Peterborough’s Key Theatre takes the audience on Snow White’s journey with the characters Snow White, Camilla the Cook, The Man in The Mirror, Violet, Wicked Mizrabelle and Prince Hugo, alongside the talented ensemble. The pantomime puts a contemporary, modern twist on the classic tale, through modifying the story to reflect the audience of 2024. However, the traditional values of pantomime remain, ensuring comedy, audience participation, slapstick and lots of laughter.
Written by David Griffin-Stephens, who also stars as the famous panto Dame “Camilla the Cook”, Griffin-Stephens writes a witty panto that is hilarious and full of jokes that both adults and younger audience members will enjoy. Griffin-Stephens is a standout performer – with his interactions particularly with the younger school children in attendance, being absolutely fantastic to watch. Griffin-Stephens constantly had the audience in stitches, particularly during jokes that were aimed at older audience members!
The costumes for Camilla were iconic and clearly well-created, ranging from skirts covered in fast-food or gingerbread. Writer, director and costume designer David Griffin-Stephens has clearly been an asset to this production. The entire production is spectacular due to his talent, both on and off the stage.
The writing is packed with feel-good musical numbers that has the audience clapping, laughing, singing and dancing along. The catchy song “Problem with Panto” has a hidden message about the problems with pantomime – putting a modern twist on the genre. Modern themes are mentioned throughout the performance, such as Snow White’s (played by Kellianna Jay) desires to do as she pleases, instead of being forced to marry a Prince. Snow White also expresses passion to be an engineer and set up a girls engineering school, giving young girls in the audience a powerful, inspiring message to break traditional gender stereotypes, instead of the only option being to marry a Prince. Snow White was a superstar – her vocals were incredible, and Jay portrayed Snow White as a relatable, inspiring young woman, through an adaptation for 2024 which still kept the traditional character we all know and love.
Themes such as consent and the power and addictive controlling element of social media were covered throughout the performance, with the Man in the Mirror portraying a social media manager who made sure Mizrabelle was “the most popular in the land” with “lots of likes and followers”. The underlying serious tone, such as the role of technology and social media within the comedy was a powerful move, as pantomime is the perfect place to portray serious topics in a light-hearted way. The introduction of these themes gives the audience an opportunity to consider how consent is portrayed in traditional fairy tales, alongside the impact of technology in our modern world, which was particularly useful for younger audiences who are growing up with the impact of social media.
The pantomime is packed with traditional pantomime conventions, such as lighting, pyrotechnics, slapstick, puppets, various props and crazy costumes. The pantomime gives the audience the opportunity to interact and cheer alongside Violet (Natalie Durkin), the Man in the Mirror (Andrew Sharpe), Camilla the Cook (David Griffin-Stephens) and Prince Hugo (Max Taptygin) which is wonderful to see.
The cast invites the audience to sing and dance along, which is a feel-good moment for the audience, leaving us in stitches. There are also plenty of opportunities to boo and shout at the evil, wicked Mizrabelle, who was portrayed incredibly well by Katie Stasi, as Mizrabelle’s wicked evil laugh had me on the edge of my seat.
The Key Theatre is based in Peterborough, with the script referring to many local towns and villages, such as “Stamford Snobs”, Spalding, Stanground, Stilton and Fletton of the Fens. These mentions made the performance more personal, relatable and funny to an audience based in Peterborough. The cast worked perfectly together, as the comedic script and choreography was in faultless timing. A particular relationship that deserves credit is the relationship between Griffin-Stephens and Durkin which was hilarious, and conveyed through a hysterical scene where the pair made a cake for Snow White’s birthday. The cast worked impeccably together, with the ensemble and main cast putting on an incredible, hilarious show, with the perfect amount of audience participation.
Snow White is fuelled with back-to-back scenes of comedy, humour and slapstick fights, alongside dance, movement, choreography and singing. The comedy is absolutely hilarious, with many feel-good moments that families, school children and theatregoers will enjoy. Key Theatres’ Snow White is the ideal mix of comedy and modern messages, as the pantomime brings the traditional story up-to-date in a classic, feel-good, pantomime style, which suits every audience member.
Described as “Snow White like you’ve never seen it before” by the Key Theatre – it is the perfect show this Christmas, this panto is a modern, comical twist on the fairy tale classic of Snow White and had the audience of Peterborough in stitches. It is a cheerful, comforting show that does not want to be missed.
★★★★★
Snow White plays Peterborough’s Key Theatre from Saturday 7th December – Sunday 5th January.
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