| It's Panto time! | Aladdin runs at Cambridge Arts Theatre from Friday 8th December to Sunday 14th January. Box office 01223 357851. Beauty & The Beast is on at the Broadway Theatre in Peterborough from Friday 15th December to Sunday 7th January. Box office 01733 316100. Cinderella will be at the Angles Theatre in Wisbech from Friday 15th - Friday 29th December. Bookings 01945 474447. Cinderella We're Having a Ball comes to the Cresset in Peterborough from Tuesday 19th December to Saturday 6th January. Box office 01733 265705. Robin Hood & the Magic Forest will be at the Key Theatre in Peterborough from Saturday 2nd to Sunday 31st December. Bookings 01733 552439. Snow White on Ice skates into Cambridge Corn Exchange on Thursday 14th December and ends its run on Saturday 30th December. Box office 01223 357851. |
| "There’s such a fantastic buzz around the first week of rehearsals..." | | Michael Fenton Stevens |
Hi, I’m Mike Fenton Stevens. I’m back here at Cambridge Arts Theatre in panto for the fourth time, and this year I’m playing the most daring, outrageous dame of them all – Widow Twankey! I can’t believe it’s that time again. It doesn’t seem like long ago I was here playing Sarah The Cook in Dick Whittington.  | | Michael in the flesh! |
There’s such a fantastic buzz around the first week of rehearsals – we get to do our first read through and of course catch up on all the gossip from fellow cast members. Julie Buckfield, who’s playing Aladdin, and Matt Crosby, who’s playing Wishee Washee, both starred in last year’s show. We’ve all had busy 2006’s so there’s loads to talk about. Brad Fitt and Scott Ritchie have written a really funny script this year and of course we all like to add our own favourite jokes during rehearsals so the audience is well and truly rolling in the aisles. We also make sure all the panto conventions we know and love are there in abundance. That means lots of opportunities for the audience to shout ‘It’s behind you’, and boo and hiss until they’re breathless. It’s also things that are perhaps less famous like getting James Hirst, who plays the evil Abanazer, to enter from stage left and us goodies to enter from stage right. This week we’ve already been hard at work on our lines and songs and blocking the choreography for the most important numbers. If that wasn’t enough, we’ve also been out and about making sure everyone knows about the show – many people would have seen us at the switching on of the Cambridge Christmas lights on Sunday in the Market Square. The lovely Cambridgeshire Fire Service hoisted Matt Crosby and I up into the air in full costume and we shouted at each other and the crowd through megaphones – it was hilarious! Loads of staff from the theatre came along in a whole range of panto costumes too, including the new marketing and press officer Al. Somehow I don’t think he was expecting to be dressed up as Ali Baba in his first month but that’s show business… Anyway, must go now and get my dance shoes on – see you later this week when I’ll tell you more about the rehearsals!
Love Mike x x x | 
