Aladdin: An energetic, ambitious night of quickfire comedy

ALADDIN

Everyman, Cork
★★★☆☆

We used to believe it wasn’t really a pantomime unless we were sitting in the balcony. That was at an age when we believed anything, yet up on the Everyman theatre’s balcony, steeply tiered above gilded domes appropriately suggestive of the Orient, disbelief is not merely suspended but banished by the ebullient overture from music director Anth Kaley’s band.

For this Cada Performing Arts and Everyman presentation, Princess Jasmine is a missing person searcing for a missing person. Despite the predictably Covid-reduced circumstances the story moves on to involve a cave filled with riches beyond desire and, as most of tonight's half-capacity house seems to be loudly aware, a magic lamp and its genie.

Dayl Cronin and Marion Goggin sing the lead roles with the warm conviction required to overcome the decibels rising beyond the footlights while the villianous Michael Sands is jeered with every sweep of his glittering cloak

After many years of pantomime productions, director Catherine Mahon-Buckley doesn’t fail in this offering, not least in its ability to appease an audience avid for participation. Donal McNinch’s lighting sends constellations sweeping across the auditorium, and choreography from Kelly-Ann Murphy supports an energetic cast, with costumes from Jessica Healy-Rettig displaying a colour spectrum some distance beyond an ambitious rainbow.

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These perennial requirements of the pantomime tradition are bolstered by the quickfire comedy of Ciaran Bermingham as Twankey and Fionula Linehan as Wishee pulling the innards out of every intelligible line. Dayl Cronin and Marion Goggin sing the lead roles with the warm conviction required to overcome the decibels rising beyond the footlights while the villainous Michael Sands is jeered with every sweep of his glittering cloak.

But unbelief can be suspended only so far: a menopause joke is not exactly age-appropriate here – nor, along with the toilet humour, is it even funny. And set designer Olan Wrynn might have ensured that the fabulous cave might have been a little more fabulous.

Runs at the Everyman, Cork, until Sunday, January 16th