Theatre reviews: Jackie and the Beanstalk | Scrooge

IS IT A DUMPLING? Is it a cupcake? Is it an explosion in a glitter factory? No, it’s the imminent arrival of the great Scottish panto season, spreading across the land in a roaring wave of daft outfits, bad songs, and joyful audience participation. It comes to something, though, when the very first panto of the year is not so much a seasonal show as a send-up of the whole genre, and if ever you wanted evidence that pastiching the panto is a dangerous game, to be played only with real comic intent, then the danger signals are spray-painted all over Johnny McKnight’s latest panto at the MacRobert in Stirling – which, to general rejoicing, celebrates its 40th birthday this year.

It’s not that Jackie And The Beanstalk is anything short of a lively, rollicking show, with plenty of fine panto qualities. In offering a new take on the Jack and The Beanstalk story – in which McKnight writes, directs, and also stars as the embattled Dame Von Trot – it transforms the hero into a feisty tomboy heroine, eloquently played by Helen McAlpine, and adds the odd comic riff about a quest for the lost ring-a-ding-ring-ting-thing – the little panto sound that signals true love has arrived. Without it, no slushy romantic songs can be sung, to the great relief of all the wee boys in the audience. The show has a decent villain in the giant’s henchman Count Monty Bisto (“I don’t need friends, I’ve got Sky HD”), an excellent pantomime cow, and the MacRobert’s usual outstanding use of large teams of young performers from the Stirling area, playing elves, villagers and Bisto’s team of slaves, with skill and relish.

What this show lacks, though, is the kind of thought-through satirical theme that McKnight has succeeded in weaving into past MacRobert pantos – the kind of theme which plays a vital role in keeping all the fun on track, and providing a dramatic base on which all the incidental comedy and raunchy frolicking can flourish. There are references to celebrity culture, of course, and – perhaps – the first-ever beanstalk made out of giant Heinz Baked Beans cans. In the end, though, the jokery, the additional material and the constant interruptions to the narrative simply get the better of the story itself – leaving McKnight’s famously rude and raunchy Dame persona looking a shade exposed and crude for no reason. It’s loud, it’s colourful, it’s fun, and it carries huge, important elements of the panto tradition, but it needs a stronger script, more story, and – pace the little lads in the audience – a bit more heart.

Absolutely all heart, by contrast, is the familiar Bill Kenwright touring production of Scrooge, now paying a brief but well-timed pre-Christmas visit to the Theatre Royal in Glasgow. First seen back in 2003, this soft-hearted take on Dickens’s great Christmas classic, A Christmas Carol, stars the invincible Tommy Steele – set to celebrate his 75th birthday this month – as a comedy version of the wretched old miser who learns his lesson about meanness of spirit and the love of money, in one dramatic night before Christmas.

Closely based on the fine 1970 film musical written by Leslie Bricusse, and starring Albert Finney, Scrooge is undeniably a lightweight version of A Christmas Carol, and should make an interesting contrast with the National Theatre of Scotland’s new take on the story, due to open in Govan this weekend. It would be wrong, though, to underestimate the emotional force of Bob Tomson’s beautifully staged production, superbly designed by Paul Farnsworth.

For despite one or two excessively jolly songs, and occasional lapses into Oliver-style thumbs-in-lapels choreography, it takes us straight back not only to the moral heart of Dickens’s great story – his plea that “mankind is our business”, and that we harden our hearts at our peril – but to a time in postwar British history, around 1970, when we felt at ease with that great humanitarian message, and confident that our welfare state made it impossible that we should see such poverty on our streets again.

No British writer or director could possibly produce such a musical today: the postwar nation that created it is long gone. And as Tommy Steele struts his stuff on the Theatre Royal stage, it’s worth remembering that long history of the politics of compassion in Britain, and giving it some thought.

Some of us, though, are not quite ready to switch into Christmas mode yet, and those in the mood for something austere, clear and tragic could do worse than head for St Bride’s in Edinburgh, where John Naples-Campbell’s randomACT company are presenting a full-blooded version of Sophocles’s Antigone, with a post-student cast of 15, including a striking six-strong female chorus in dust-smeared grey skirt-suits, like refugees from the fall of Berlin. The quality of the acting varies; the lighting falls from high above onto the oblong floor of the hall, with the audience ranged around on four sides, and sometimes leaves the actors’ faces in darkness.

Yet if Bafta-winner Kellyanne Farquhar sometimes struggles for the vocal clarity she needs as Antigone – the orphaned girl who insists on burying her rebel brother in defiance of the law, and faces death as a consequence – her stage presence and focus is impressive, and at least matched by Eddie McDowell’s Creon, and Emma Taylor’s memorable Leader of the Chorus. And although there are one or two rough moments here, there’s also a terrific sense of sorrow and pity; as the Chorus take a final, pensive look back at a landscape devastated by a leader who failed to understand the meaning of mercy, or the truth – well known to Dickens, too – that justice exercised without compassion is no justice at all.

Jackie and the Beanstalk - The Macrobert, Stirling ***

Scrooge - Theatre Royal, Glasgow ****

Antigone - St Bride’s Centre, Edinburgh ***

• Jackie And The Beanstalk runs until 7 January, Scrooge until 3 December, Antigone until 2 December.

Theatre reviews: Jackie and the Beanstalk | Scrooge | Antigone