REVIEW: Tread the Boards bring Robin Hood to the Cidermill Theatre, Chipping Campden

Robin Hood, Cidermill Theatre, Chipping Campden, Playing until 31st December

By Peter Buckroyd

IT’S a sure sign that Christmas is well on the way in Chipping Campden when the panto opens at the Cidermill Theatre. This year it’s Robin Hood directed by John-Robert Partridge for Tread the Boards Company and it has everything you would want for a family pantomime: lots of music, excellent dance routines choreographed by Helen Leek, splendid costumes by Molly Limpets, a joke a minute, a wonderful pantomime dame who wears a different extravagant outfit in every scene, several standard panto routines like the ghost accompanied by “behind you” shouts, the now traditional involvement of three children from the audience who are asked at the end to identify their favourite character, some very funny routines completely irrelevant to the story and, most importantly, masses of opportunities for the audience to join in with their reactions.

There aren’t any Merry Men: these roles are instead occupied by Dame Dotty, Silly Willy and two dancers, Chloe Prince and Bethany Tolhurst-McWattGreen.

There’s very little story to Robin Hood. The title character is called upon to stop the wicked Sheriff of Nottingham raising taxes and to rescue Abigail Drennan’s Maid Marion (Abigail is also musical director of the show) from the Sheriff’s clutches in order to marry her himself. That’s just about it, really.

John-Robert Partridge’s text adds some nice little twists. Ben Butler’s Robin Hood is sweet but rather a wimp – not at all the butch swashbuckling stereotype. Jon Kerr’s Sheriff of Nottingham is not the ugly wicked stereotype, but both manly and attractive. You can see why Dame Dotty fancies him.

It’s hard to keep your eyes off Dame Dotty, brilliantly played by| John-Robert Partridge whose focus and concentration is complete in every scene, down to the planned moments where he almost corpses either at the antics of his fellow actors or to the interventions, not always wholly appropriate, by the audience.

The best moments I thought came at the beginning of the second half involving Dame Dotty and her son Silly Willy, played with breathtaking energy by George Ormerod, as they engage in cookery, for example.

The set is more elaborate than we have seen in a Cidermill panto before, with flats, several different backdrops and an apron for scenes between Chelsea Marie’s Fairy Fabulous and the Sheriff, with her, the good character stage right and he, the baddie, stage left (the audience’s right as they look at the stage) – a completely traditional device.

There were a few technical glitches when I saw it right at the beginning of its run, but these will have been sorted by the time you see it.

It was received rapturously by the audience which consisted of people from four to 80. Go see it. It will be a perfect addition to your Christmas celebrations.