Review: Peter Panto And The Incredible Stinkerbell – Tron Theatre

A theatre critic can only review what they see on any given day, so whilst the big, chaotic heart of Peter Panto & The Incredible Stinkerbell will conjure a different show each time the curtain rises, what I saw was fandabidozi. Given creator, panto dame, and post-modern Panto king Johnny McKnight’s fondness for ‘vintage’ pop-culture references, I invoke the Krankies without the least shame.

Purists can relax (can they?), the essential parts of J.M. Barrie’s story are present, just turned on their heads. Peter Panto still hasn’t grown up, and in Star Penders’ able hands, the kid is every bit as fun, and incredibly irritating, as an eternal adolescent should be. His best pal Stinkerbell – McKnight – is a fairy famed for malodorous flatulence with a day job in charge of Neverland’s premier Chippy where ‘Dolphin-ately Yummy’ will cost you £97 for a single, and a cool £100 for a supper. One presumes it’s line-caught.

It’s never clear who’s having more fun, the audience or McKnight who conquers the Tron auditorium with gallous delight, dry wit, and a mischievous smile. He loves being a panto dame, and it suits him very well.

“Peter Panto still hasn’t grown up, and in Star Penders’ able hands, the kid is every bit as fun, and incredibly irritating, as an eternal adolescent should be.”

Of course, you can’t have Peter and ‘Stink’ without Wendy, and West End Wendy (Emma Mullen) – complete with ‘cultured’ vowels – is soon abducted from her bedroom for an ‘awfully big adventwer’, leaving Marc Mackinnon’s towering pink frou-frou canine Nana to comfort her wealthy parents.

Off they pop to the land of eternal youth, where – of course, await Captain Hook and his sidekick ~~Smee~~ Anita Wee-Wee, the former with a missing hand, and a score to settle with our Peter. Robert Jack makes a cracking villain fit for the Rocky Horror Picture Show, camp, charming, and – oddly – likeable. With Peter being quite so – amusingly – irritating, bumping him off seems quite rational really. (My babysitting services come without guarantees of survival – I get very few bookings.)

**Click to enlarge and for image details.**

Katie Barnett thrives as his accomplice in crocodile-dodging, charmingly dense, and perpetually confused by her own name. She, and Mullen’s alter-ego, the perpetually hungover Jaeger Lily, share the panto’s big romance. Their big number, in Stinkerbell’s Chippy, might be cynically aware of being the show’s ‘big love song’, but it’s still a sweet ode to love free of unwelcome ‘norms’. It certainly helps that both have cracking voices to accompany their character-comedy chops.

Subversive as McKnight’s vision of Peter Pan may be, this joyful panto has more in common with the shows I enjoyed when in single digits than many of its contemporaries. It’s big, clever, and a lot of fun. Designer Kenny Miller’s technicolour set leaves no prop or costume untouched, be it Stinkerbell’s unicorn-suitable Chip-Shop or Peter’s sparkling emerald jacket and freckled cheeks. It’s a world fit for cheeky heroes in sequined shorts, conflicted pirates, toilet humour and cheery, hopeful anthems such as ‘All Children Grow Up’.

With Composer, Music Director, and one-man band, Ross Brown, stage-right, I was immediately transported back to my childhood, watching my Godfather Kevin at the piano beside the Dundee Rep stage at Christmas. Who needs an orchestra when you let one talented musician do their thing? Brown does so with gusto, including a seriously catchy ‘Hook by Crook’.

“It’s a world fit for cheeky heroes in sequined shorts, conflicted pirates, toilet humour and cheery, hopeful anthems such as ‘All Children Grow Up’. “

However, the fairy dust transforming Peter Panto And The Incredible Stinkerbell from an excellent show to something rarer still lies in playing with the audience, and not at them. Not every show, as per my visit, will open on a sugar-amped, and quite bloodthirsty unit of Brownies in the front rows, but not every show would be able to handle them – less still to harness their wide-eyed mania. With the freedom to ad-lib, the cast made merry with the childish ‘truth bombs’ and persistent attempts to catch the dry ice. ‘You can get fat!’ enthused one when asked for the benefits of growing up, and the show never looked back.

McKnight hasn’t only assembled an excellent panto, he has gathered a troupe of actor-comedians with matching glints in their eyes. The results will be unpredictable – but never boring. You won’t regret a Christmas date with this first-rate panto about love, friends, family, and fairies with libidinous desires for the neighbourhood pirate.

All Images: Tommy Ga-Ken Wan