Spence cranks up camp factor for Cinders

AFTER the disappointment of last year’s “Snow White”, when two performers damaged the show badly but one managed by his quiet brilliance to save it, hopes weren’t too high for this latest big-scale city panto.

But he’s back, and this time comedian Tam Ryan — who triumphed in the comedy role last time — doesn’t have to work so hard to make this traditional show a hit. But he works hard anyway.

The big Manchester panto can be a bit hit and miss: performers chosen for their fame rather than their stage skills are thrown together and under-rehearsed before being thrown on stage to fend for themselves amid massive glittery sets, special effects and a big band: no match for a compact, honed show like Oldham’s, say.

But this year, everything comes together at the Opera House.

Eric Potts’s script — despite being locked into a story of romantic interludes that leaves little time for knockabout fun, his speciality — gets humour out of the crowd-pleasing Ryan (as an adopted-Manc Buttons), while the usually intensely annoying (but not to the crowd, which loves him) Louie Spence plays the campest Dandini in the kingdom.

The latter’s prancing, lisping and innuendo work rather well here; probably because by now he has stopped parodying Louie and is exaggerating the parody itself.

He can certainly dance though, as he proves when Dandini gets more stage time than in any panto before. He might speak a little more loudly and slowly, but be thankful for small mercies. Suzanne Shaw as Cinders is lovely, sings adequately and plays the beautiful victim with great charm.

David Fleeshman is more than a match for the talent round him in the thankless Hardup role.

And if you thought putting Spence up against a couple of famous Manchester drag-queen actors, David Dale and Drew Christie (as the Ugly Sisters), might be a recipe for camp overload, in fact it isn’t: if anything, the sisters are butch compared with Spence.

Everything is lavishly done, there are two sweet little Shetlands and a nice costume swap in the transformation scene and the rest of the cast is well up to standard.

One of the most consistently enjoyable city-centre pantos in a while.

To December 31.