This is a panto which is fun without being funny.

You smile - you don’t exactly fall into the aisles with laughter, and the little men are masked juveniles on a clicktrack.

Still, Dame Bree Brightshine (the unsinkable Robert Rawles) is good humoured and quaint with a pleasing side-kick called Will the Jester. Together they do their best, but have little to work on in terms of script values, but one admires their diligence.

Queen Evilyn (the marvellous Rachael Barrington) is something else altogether. She is beautiful and regal, has the voice and the style which together evoke childhood memories of woods at night filled with monstrous beings, all of whom you can believe are always there at her command, although quite why she is dressed in a kind of Plantagenet costume in a panto whose period style is generally 18th century is a mystery.

Panto princes arrive and depart. Sometimes they are men, sometimes the traditional panto principal boys, who slap their thighs.

Here we have the handsome Prince Michael (Callum Roberts) who turns in a strong, convincing performance that lifts the evening considerably.

Mr Roberts sings well and has acting skills that make his prince the perfect man for Snow White (Hannah Farquharson).

When Prince Michael kissed Snow White awake after the poison apple sequence, two little girls near me stopped eating their Smarties for a moment - you can’t get a better endorsement of panto magic than that.