Magic and merriment for all ages

A night out before Christmas when you’re up past bedtime, surrounded by the smell of the greasepaint and the roar of the crowd, is the stuff memories are made of, memories that become a family tradition which children, when they grow up, will want to share with their own kids, whether it’s a traditional panto, a festive film, a beautiful ballet or the story of Ebenezer Scrooge.

Fantastic films

Movie buffs are spoiled for choice. Raymond Briggs's hand-drawn festive classic The Snowman returns to the National Concert Hall and will be accompanied by Howard Blake's scene-setting score, all the more enchanting for being played live by the NCH's orchestra. It's a gorgeous way to kick off the season and there are 10 screenings to accommodate demand, two on Friday, December 16th, and four each on Saturday, December 17th, and Sunday, December 18th. See nch.ie.

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Cast members of Cheerios panto Aladdin at Tivoli Theatre, Dublin. Photograph: Leon Farrell/Photocall Ireland

The Pavilion Theatre, in Dún Laoghaire, is screening the 1964 fantasy musical Mary Poppins on Saturday, December 3rd, followed on Thursday, 15th, by the 1951 black-and-white version of A Christmas Carol, then Elf on Saturday, 17th, and the classic It's A Wonderful Life, with its good old-fashioned morality message (perhaps more salient than ever in Trump-era America), on Thursday, 22nd. See paviliontheatre.ie.

In Waterford, during Winterval, which runs until December 23rd, How the Grinch Stole Christmas will pay daily at Movies at the Reg, while Lunaflics, the drive-in cinema at Castleinch, Kilkenny, is running a programme that includes Macaulay Culkin's best-known films, Home Alone, on Friday, December 2nd, and Home Alone 2: Lost in New York, on Saturday, December 17th. See thelunaflics.com.

Musicals

Nothing beats good live theatre, and musicals offer an immersive mix of song and story with magical production surprises as one set glides away to reveal another.

The hottest ticket in town this year is the stage musical version of the hit Tom Hanks movie Big, which has its European premiere in Dublin at the Bord Gáis Energy Theatre. Opening on December 7th, the show, which heads east to London's West End early next year, will give fans the chance to see Jay McGuinness, a Strictly Come Dancing champion and singer with boyband The Wanted, play the 12-year-old boy who hates being his age and is granted his wish to be big. The result is that he becomes a boy trapped in an adult's body, who finds himself alone in New York trying to negotiate a grown-up world of all work and no play. See bordgaisenergytheatre.ie.

At Dublin's Liberty Hall Theatre, Fame: The Musical is being staged on December 2nd and 3rd, featuring a talented Irish cast ranging in age from 13 to 22 years old. The new stage version of the film and TV series follows some students at New York's School of Performing Arts through their four-year course as they strive for excellence and survival. See libertyhalltheatre.ie.

Galway's Town Hall Theatre hosts Grease, the Musical on December 6th and 7th and Oliver, which features students from Power Performance Academy, from December 7th to 11th. See tht.ie.

Panto

Oh yes it is panto season, with TV3's Alan Hughes starring as Sammy Sausages in Aladdin, opening on December 13th at the Tivoli Theatre, Dublin. Model and I'm a Celebrity, Get Me Out of Here! participant Nadia Forde treads the boards in her first panto role as leading lady Jasmine, while TV star and Big Brother winner Brian Dowling is back playing the genie.

Fans of a more modern approach to the art of panto should head across town to the Helix, where Theatreworx Productions are staging their interpretation of the same show. In Blanchardstown, the Coolmine Panto Group presents Sleeping Beauty, opening on December 6th. Parents will appreciate the ease of parking at these two venues.

The Gaiety Theatre is home to Dublin's longest-running panto, first staged in 1873. This year's show, Robin Hood and his Merry Men, opens on November 27th. Dame Joe Conlon, who celebrates his 26th year in a dress, is playing the notorious Granny McGregor in a production that, located just off the sparkly lights of Grafton Street, is a Dublin tradition.

Red Riding Hood is the gigglefest tickling Leesiders at Cork's Everyman Theatre. In the role of the dame, or Granny, is Ciaran Bermingham, who you may have seen in Young Offenders, a caper loosely based on the Dunlough Bay drugs seizure, or Dead Along the Way, a crime comedy reportedly made for €10,000, which opened the IndieCork Film Festival last month.

In Limerick's University Concert Hall, funnyman Karl Spain plays the gatekeeper in Beauty and the Beast, which opens on Monday, December 19th.

Ballet

The Nutcracker is a festive tradition that leaves many little ones wide-eyed. Take them to see a live performance by the Irish Youth Ballet at the Civic Theatre, Tallaght, running from Thursday, December 1st, to Saturday, December 3rd, or at the Pavilion, Dún Laoghaire, where it runs from Friday, December 9th, to Sunday, December 11th. Or you can watch the Royal Ballet perform live on screen from Covent Garden on Thursday, December 8th. This production celebrates the choreographer Peter Wright's 90th birthday with his version of the beautiful classical ballet, danced to Tchaikovsky's magnificent score. It will be shown at the Lighthouse Cinema in Smithfield and some suburban and rural cinemas.

Theatre

A Christmas Carol, at the Ark, Dublin, is a playful adaptation of Charles Dickens' classic story, starring Bryan Burroughs, of Beowulf: The Musical, and Ian Lloyd Anderson, who starred in Love/Hate and Game of Thrones. The 45-minute show faithfully tells the story of Ebenezer Scrooge using only physical and vocal skills, with many hats, some scarves, fairy lights and an Ikea desk lamp. See ark.ie.

Days Out to See Santa

Dublin Zoo: Santa's grotto on the great lawn at Dublin Zoo is open every weekend as well as on Thursday, December 22nd, Friday, December 23rd, and Saturday, December 24th. Children will be taken on a trip through the enchanting grotto and greeted by Santa and his elves. Afterwards, they can explore the wonders of Dublin Zoo and make like Dr Doolittle by talking to the animals, including some new additions to the family: an elephant calf, a rhinoceros calf and a baby western lowland gorilla. See dublinzoo.ie.

Mullingar: Inspire the kids with an environmental take on Santa at Belvedere House, from December 3rd to 18th, where Mr Claus will help kids pot up seasonal native Irish trees which the children can then plant in their gardens at home. The hope is that the trees will grow alongside the children and become part of a lifetime memory of a special visit. Also available to buy will be wildflower seed shakers to attract fairies, and old-fashioned Victorian candy. See belvedere-house.ie.

Waterford: Santa has set up his grotto in the Medieval Museum on Waterford's Mall. After your visit, pop into the nearby Toy Museum, where the Gaming Through the Ages exhibition is free to enter. Visitors can play some of the early, first-generation video games and see how gaming has changed over the decades. Expect to see a collection of consoles and original arcade game machines, including Pong, Pacman and Space Invaders, as well as Cube consoles, Atari 2600s, Sega megadrives and X-boxes. See winterval.ie.

Corofin, Co Clare: Take your kids to see Santa actually coming down the chimney at the Farmyard, outside Corofin, where the kids gather and sing carols while sitting on bales of hay as St Nick drops down the chimney. Before this, they get to see a live crib, where they can help Joseph feed the donkey, sheep, and other animals, such as alpaca and rabbits, not listed in the nativity tale. The beef-fattening farm is run by the Quinn family and there is transport by tractor and trailer from the crib to see Santa. See thefarmyard.ie.

Shannon: Older kids might like to get a sense of what it's really like to be circumnavigating the globe on Christmas Eve. Take to the skies with Santa at Atlantic AirVenture in Shannon, where you get to meet Captain Claus on the flight deck before taking a simulator flight challenge to land a 747. This aviation museum which is open on Saturday, December 10th, Sunday, December 11th, Saturday, December 17th, and Sunday, December 18th, only. See atlanticairventure.com.