Reviews

Johnstone Phoenix Theatre Group

We had the children crying with trepidation at the prologue and then with compassion when they realised the beast was dead! On one occasion you could hardly hear the fairies song at the end for the sobs which, gladly, led to cheers and laughter for the community song and finale.
(Beauty the & Beast )

Horsmonden Players Brenchley, Kent

Thank you for your card regarding our Production of 'Sleeping Beauty'.

Every one loves the pantos, not too wordy, full of audience participation and with lots of parts - good for amateurs.
Song suggestions are always extremely helpful. We did an extra song when the Fairy Godmother enters after Sleeping Beauty has pricked her finger and gone to bed. They came in asking what did 'the assembled cast' want. The reply in song was "We'll tell you what we want what we really want etc." It brought the house down and required an encore.......

Anne Edwards (Producer) 9th Jan

Wirksworth Glee Club, Matlock. Derbyshire

Having just recovered from our weeks performance of Frankenstein I thought I would enclosed a cutting from our local paper and some photos from our dress rehearsal
We had a very successful show with the comments of "The best Panto yet!!".
We have many talented people, but the script was excellent and very funny, we had our school girls doing a spice girls dance which went down well.
We sold 650-700 tickets which we were very pleased with as we like to be able to donate any profit to our local
charities.
This years poster is by an eleven year old local schoolboy. This won our competition which was for free Panto tickets and a chance to have their design on our poster.

Perhaps one year you will come and see us yourselves

Miss A.M. Hargreaves
(We would love to but there are so many great productions we would have to be like Father Christmas getting round them all.. but you never know! thanks Allan)

Take Your Seat, Syresham Entertainment & Theatre.

We are a small village of around 700 people and this was our first panto for over a decade. I was asked to direct it as I am a broadcast television
cameraman and for some reason, that qualified me for the job! Over 85% of the village either turned up to watch it or were involved, it was absolutely worth it. Our initial aim was to have fun - we certainly had that!
We picked David's version of Cinderella from several others available at NODA and everyone agreed it shone out as something special. It was very original and most important, very modern with brilliant scenes such as Blind Date. We kept to the script faithfully and also the 60's songs which were learnt by our Panto Boys Band, average age 13.
Being in the entertainment industry, I gave it the full works with lights and especially David's funny sound
effects. Some of the lads built a fantastic set in a barn from September and based it on a comment on the back of the script about the 'Adams Family' look. The cast worked very hard and ranged in age from the 5 year old
'Daiseys' to the 65 year old 'Boris'.
It was perfect.

Keith Watts
Producer Syresham Entertainment & Theatre.

Wilburton Theatre Group.

In 1996 we performed Frankenstein the Panto and we believe the huge success of that panto was a major factor as to why so many more people wanted to be involved in Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves. This panto was a huge success and was thoroughly enjoyed by both us the performers and the record number of people who came to see the performances.
We have found both the two panto's extremely well written, funny and both have provided a mixture of
entertainment for all generations. We are currently planning our 1998 production and have already received
details from NODA of all the other panto's written by David.

Ashley Gwynn
Chairman Wilburton Theatre Group.

Spittal Variety Group.

You may have read the book or seen the film...but if you are going to see Spittal Variety Group's latest pantomime Sleeping Beauty, just forget all of that, because this is something different. Any resemblance to the original version is just a fluke.
Of course all the essential elements are there - goodies, baddies, fun, laughter and colour... but hands up those who can remember a green cannibal in the original version? You can't?
In this version the principals are overshadowed to a certain extent by the comedy characters and in this production laughter takes centre stage.

Press Cutting 22/1/98 Review by Janet Wakenshaw and Pictures by
Michael Reilly.

Wellington Arts Association, Pantomime.

The Wellington Pantomime Group are great fans of Swan Pantos, having presented four. We first came across him with 'Frankenstein the Panto' six years ago, which was a great success locally and was the turning point in our history and got us noticed. 'Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves' very nearly won us the prestigious Somerset Federation of Drama top award in 1996 (we were runners up but I'm sure we would have won if our Dame wasn't hospitalised a day before we opened!!) David's 'Cinderella' enabled us to sweep the board last year winning all eight top 'Oscars' including Best Panto and as I write we are in the middle of running David's 'Aladdin' which is keeping the audiences in stitches.
We are one of the top Pantomime Societies in the West Country, certainly in Somerset, where the Panto
tradition is very strong. We compete against up to thirty productions for the dramatic awards each year and were the first to win with a Swan Panto.

Geoff Cross
Chairman Wellington Arts Association
Artistic Director Wellington Pantomime Group.