Westacre Theatre's Peter Pan had audience hooked in inventive Christmas show
The cast of Peter Pan at Westacre Theatre had the audience hooked from start to finish in their inventive Christmas show on Saturday night.
Adults and children delighted in the performance as they were taken on a journey to Neverland in this swashbuckling adventure written and developed by Becky Owen- Fisher.
The story was brought up to date with references to PS4s and WIFI and the character of Peter Pan was played cleverly by different members of the cast, identifiable by an actor wearing a pair of goggles.
Not content with just one Tinkerbell, this role was played by three actors, all with a different trait and costume, with one refusing to speak and only communicating by text, much to the amusement of the audience.
There were many laugh out loud moments and elements of pantomime with some traditional audience participation with all of us gleefully shouting ‘we believe in fairies’ at the appropriate moment.
Much giggling from younger members of the audience showed that the actors were adept in the comical moments as we all know children are a tough crowd to make laugh.
Rachel Beckley and her daughter Naomi, 7, from Marham made this show their special festive outing and Rachel said: “It is really good and we know one of the girls in it.
“When we were looking for a theatre trip we saw this and we are both really loving it.”
The whole cast were on form, using a cleverly created set which acted as different scenes and eventually culminated in being the jaws of the crocodile whose imminent presence was heard as a mobile ring tone rather than a ticking clock.
Special mentions to Captain Hook and Smee, a wonderfully comic performance from both and their partnership can only get stronger as the run continues.
The pirates clearly had a lot of fun in their roles and one stand out performance was the nut throwing pirate who transformed into Peter Pan, which was particularly impressive.
A mermaid who bites people’s faces off at night had some lovely comic business and the Lost Boys were an impressive team, singing and playing
instruments with gusto.
The trio of young actors gave their all as Wendy, John and
Michael and the whole cast had extremely good singing voices as an ensemble and solos.
With boundless energy, clever use of set by the technical crew and a touching ending, Peter Pan at Westacre Theatre is full of festive fun this Christmas and the show runs until December 24, with two shows a day at 3pm and 7pm.
As said in the show: “Thank you for looking after us Peter Pan.”
by Jenny Beake
