Laugh-out-loud ball with Cinders

HAVING a ball . . . Baroness Hardup, Buttons, the Ugly Sisters and Cinderella

I got back to the UK from holiday early on Saturday morning after an eight-hour flight, fighting jet lag and a stinking cold.

I mention this to point out the supreme test this Cinders faced: could I laugh, merely groan... or just fall asleep?

For the third year running the Coliseum panto came through, kicking colds into touch, punishing jet lag with laughs and chortling in the face of fatigue.

This Cinders is funny and tuneful (courtesy of MD David Bintley), with bright choreography from Beverley Edmunds, and is packed with ideas — including parodies of Psy and Jessie J, a new slosh machine, knockabout humour and a way to work the Ugly Sisters that proves the show’s highlight.

Where most theatres go for drag-act sisters whose bitching occasionally appears a little too camp, co-writers Fine Time Fontayne and (director) Kevin Shaw have picked a pair of young Les Dawsons, whose cruelty to Cinders seems to be a substitute for their true calling in a rugby defensive line.

Leigh Symonds and Paul David-Gough as Rubella and Salmonella Hardup are nasty like a couple of playground bullies — which works well because the joke level of their cruelty also comes from the playground. That they are dressed like a couple of colour-blind Victorian schoolgirls by Coliseum designer incarnate Celia Perkins only adds to the effect.

Yet again the show’s writer and dame, Fine Time Fontayne, grows into the role (of Baroness Hardup), giving himself some good running gags, playing with the familiar nature of the show (“This year I’m called...”), adding 12 months to last year’s Metrolink jokes and lamenting, in audience-splitting sing-along terms, the loss of the stalls’ aisle.

Fontayne clearly has a great time, as does Richard J Fletcher, who adds more knockabout mirth as the audience’s pal, Buttons, this year making a cute stuffed fox the centre of his audience conspiracy.

He also makes a great partner for Lisa Holliman’s Cinders, who is sweet and cute throughout. Liz Carney is a funny fairy godmother (and Dandini) and Justine Elizabeth Bailey a non-nonsense prince, both vital members of a strong team.

But opening night had a slightly forced look at times, and took a while to warm up. Celia Perkins has also clearly been given less money for Fontayne’s extravagant costumes, though what results is again brilliant.

Another genuine Christmas treat then — and the Coliseum has already taken around £20,000 for next year’s panto, Jack and the Beanstalk, in an ultra-early sales trick now being copied by other theatres.

Cinderella runs until January 12