Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs

Published Monday 10 December 2007 at 15:35 by Jane Garner

Shrewsbury’s Christmas panto is always a sell-out. Tickets are already being booked for 2008’s Robin Hood, the last pantomime at the historic music hall before the move to a posh new complex across the river. Many members of the audience qualify as veterans, having seen up to half a dozen of Spiller’s 13 festive shows, so they should know the rules. But they have forgotten how to boo. Maybe Shropshire parents are too polite to let their offspring jeer the baddie?

This made hard work for cackling Wicked Queen Ruth D’Silva, but left plenty of room for cheers for the sweeter members of the cast, especially Natalie Blair, of Neighbours fame, in her first UK panto as Snow White and Aaron Prior’s Prince Antonio. Both excelled in their musical numbers.

Daft duo Horis de Higgins (Scott King, who also co-directs) and Boris de Biggins (Matt Reed) battled valiantly with dull lines, while Andy Fleming, man of a thousand voices, ad libbed his own as Joey the Jester, raising the opening temperature from tepid to toasty. Special note should also be made of the masterful timing of the little dwarfs, played by local children, who managed cues, disembodied voices and giant heads with hardly a foot wrong.