THE first live performances at Theatre Royal Winchester since March took place earlier this month. The Jewry Street theatre hosted the first previews of its socially distanced Christmas Show, Four Dames in Search of a Panto. Four Dames in Search of a Panto features panto set pieces, including the much loved Twelve Days of Christmas,, hilarious gags, original songs and familiar faces to Winchester audiences. The panto-styled show has been created by the same team behind the theatre’s hugely successful pantomimes, including James Barry who has written and directed the production, with music by composer Simon Slater. The cast of four have all been part of the Winchester pantomime team before: Julian Eardley returns as one of the Dames – his 11th outing as a Dame in the city.
YORK has seen plenty of Ian Stroughair this year, online largely, from his Bishopthorpe kitchen in his cabaret guise as drag diva divine Velma Celli. From today, the West End musical actor, singer and dancer can be enjoyed in his home city like never before, making his York pantomime bow in York Stage’s Jack And The Beanstalk at the Covid-secure, socially distanced Theatre @41 Monkgate. Given his glamorous, glorious-voiced alter ego as Velma, you may have expected Ian to slip into the dame’s costumes, but “perhaps I’m a little young for dame,” he says. Instead, 6ft 5-in-his-boots Ian will be switching to the dark side, entering stage left as Flesh Creep in writer-director Nik Briggs’s 90-minute production on a traverse stage.