Jan's England Adventure

Well! Here are the pictures for this year's Pantomime! We performed Aladdin and had a great time doing so. For those of you who are only familiar with the Disney version of this story, there is a lot more to the story, so you will see some characters in this show that you probably haven't heard of until now. Blame Disney because they often take a lot of license with traditional fairy tales.

Anyway, our story takes place in Peking, China. Our opening scene looked liked this:

These are our dancing girls who invite the audience into the show and who do several other dances throughout the evening. Since the girls had a hard time remembering to dance and sing at the same time, the leads were standing back stage surrounding a microphone and singing the words to the song so that the audience could actually hear what they were.

This fine spectacle of a woman is Widow Twanky (played by Nicola Mayall from York 1). She is the mother of Aladdin and his brother Wishy Washy. Aladdin should be familiar, but Wishy is probably a surprise. Wishy serves as the goof-ball guy who gets the audience involved in every way and who kind of makes a joke of everything and everyone else.

Here you see Wishy Washy on the left and Aladdin on the right. Wishy was played by Sam Horwell and Aladdin by Callum Richardson, both from York 2. They both did a great job and had a lot of lines to learn as well as songs to sing. In this picture Aladdin has already been to the Cave of Wonders, found the magic lamp, and been made a prince by the Genie; thus his crown and his fancy costume.

This is the 'baddie' as they call the bad guys in British Pantomimes. This character's name is Abanazar (not to be confused with Jafar or with 'have a banana') and, of course, his sole purpose is to rule the world and have the Princess Jasmine for his wife. He was played by Nick Bortone (from York 2) and was as evil as could be, when he could remember his lines. Poor Nick never did make it through an entire performance without needing prompting or without having to ad-lib because he'd forgotten something. But! He did great with the ad-libbing and since British Panto is about silly mistakes like that, it only added to the audience's fun.

As the story goes, Abanazar buys a magic ring from a local merchant. The ring, when rubbed, releases the Slave who is bound to it. In this picture you see that slave appearing. Sadly, she doesn't have any other name than 'Slave'. She is a pretty hopeless genie (a cousin to the Genie of the lamp) who's only real power is to freeze people so they can't move. She does, however, have Ali Baba and his 10 thieves to help her and those are the guys you see standing behind her on the stage. They basically help Abanazar in all his evil plots. The Slave was played by Alyssa Mayall (from York 1).

Now we are at the royal palace where we meet the Emperor and his charming wife (vicious and manipulative, actually) the Empress. The Empress certainly wears the trousers in this family and she loves expensive shoes. In this scene she is berating the Emperor for buying too many toys (like trains and magic carpets) and telling him that their royal selves are bankrupt. The solution? Well, to marry Jasmine off to the highest princely bidder, of course. In case you couldn't tell, I am the Empress and David Richardson (from York 2) is the Emperor. Not that we are bragging, or anything, but we never messed up any of our lines in any performance!

Enter the Royal Princess to hear from her parents that she is going to be married off the next morning. Naturally, an argument ensues which ends with the departure of the Empress and Emperor (You WILL do as you are told!) and Jasmine bursting into tears and throwing a raging temper tantrum (she is very spoiled). Ting Ming (her handmaiden who is dressed in turquoise and played by Ashley Richardson from York 2) tries to cheer her up, fails, and when Jasmine gets the chance, she runs away from the Palace ('To take charge of her own destiny', of course). Jasmine was played by two girls (Abbey, from York 2, and Rosie, from York 1--sadly I don't know either of their last names). I helped to coach Rosie on her stage presence and gestures, and I must say, she absolutely blossomed and I was so proud of her!

This is me and the Rosie-Jasmine, while we are on the subject. She did so well! She told me that she is developing in her confidence and plans on continuing with Drama at school. Good for her!
Anyway, back to the plot!

Jasmine runs away and the Royal Police are sent out into the streets of Peking to find her. Here are the Royal Police! These are 7-9 year old boys and they were a crowd pleaser! They got to do all sorts of fun stunts in chasing around after Jasmine, who meets up with Aladdin in her wanderings. Aladdin and Jasmine get away, of course, and go into hiding in Widow Twanky's Laundrette.

The Royal Guard, followed by the Emperor and Empress, track Jasmine down at the Laundrette and have Aladdin arrested. These next two pictures are of that scene. I am rubbing my hands and getting excited because I am telling Aladdin how he is going to be punished for kidnapping Jasmine. The Empress has a thing for torture, so I got to make the most of that.
I said 'I'm going to have you dragged through the streets by your toenails, for this, and then I will lock you in the dungeon and begin the torture! (Nice lines, ey? How often do you get to say that to anyone?)

Don't you think my face make-up is perfect for a torture-loving Empress? I came up with it, and painted it on, myself! As you can see, Aladdin is a bit worried about what he hears. Unfortunately, all my plans are dashed when Abanazar and his slave turn up and freeze us all. They then proceed to take Aladdin with them so that they can send him down into the Cave of Wonders to find the Genie's lamp. (Abanazar has concluded that he needs a more powerful Genie if he is going to rule the world and marry Princess Jasmine) In typical British Panto humor style, Abanazar and his slave run around putting all of us frozen people into funny positions. They put wigs and clown noses on the policemen as well.

So, this is how Abanazar puts me and the Emperor to get a laugh from the crowd. I'm sure the Emperor did really want to choke his wife on occasion--she isn't a very nice person. I must confess that it was hard to hold that position for the length of time we had to hold it.

So Abanazar and Aladdin go to the Cave of Wonders, Aladdin is forced to go inside to look for the lamp. While inside, he meets our cute primary kids. They are 'jewels' who are more than happy to help Aladdin find the lamp and teach him the rules that go with it. The crowd loved them, how could you not? They are so cute. Just so you can see one of them up close take a gander at little Davide Bortone (In real life, he's the youngest son of Nick Bortone who is playing Abanazar):

These kids sang two songs, one of which was a spoof on 'Diamonds are a Girl's best friend'. Their lyrics were 'Diamonds will be your best friend'. Aladdin dutifully follows their instructions, rubs the lamp and out pops the Genie!

This is Shawn McKenna (from York 2) nearly glowing in the dark he's so blue! I heard from members of the audience that his white teeth nearly overpowered them in that blue face. Shawn did a fantastic job being the larger than life Genie. I'm surprised he didn't lose his voice after singing and shouting so loudly night after night. He performed the Robin Williams 'You've never had a friend like me' song nearly as well as Robin Williams, so he was a hit!

Here we see the Genie with Aladdin before Aladdin is made a prince so he can return to the palace and present himself as one of the princes who is seeking to marry Jasmine. Of course, the Genie gets Aladdin out of the Cave of Wonders by the usual method . . .

Magic Carpet! There are two people on opposite ends of this contraption making it go back and forth. Any guesses who those two are? Well, it's me and David Richardson. When we weren't being the Emperor and Empress, we were moonlighting as the stage crew and had the interesting job of changing the scenery and sorting out all the props and so forth. I've never done that before and enjoyed learning about how it all works. It wasn't easy moving the dead weight of that cart back and forth. As for the plot, this is where the interval happened.

So the second half of the panto is underway and Aladdin has returned to Peking all set to become Jasmine's husband. But, before the prince selection scene at the palace can happen, the Emperor and Empress have to have another argument. I feel that the Emperor is 'too soft' on Jasmine and that is why she is spoiled and runs away from the palace all of the time and he feels that I am 'too hard' on her and that is why she runs away. We end our argument in an uncompromising huff that leads, coincidentally, to our breaking into a duet. (Nice how that always happens in these sorts of productions) We sing a spoof of 'Let's call the whole thing off'. Our lyrics are about why we can never agree on anything. So, the above picture is me singing my little heart out in front of the microphone. David and I weren't miked like the other leads were (not enough head mikes to go around) so we had to make ourselves heard by standing in front of one. David is on the opposite side of the stage from me singing into his own mike. I enjoyed the singing, actually, until the last performance when David came in to the song off key (He always sang the first few lines of the song). Thankfully, he came into key by the second verse!

After our duet, the prince selection scene begins. The first candidate, is, of course, Prince William. But since he will soon be getting married to Kate Middleton, he had to be rejected. A few other options come through and are rejected. Then suddenly, the newly made prince Aladdin shows up.

Here you see the whole entourage. Aladdin, Ting Ming, Wishy Washy, and Widow Twanky all come with Aladdin to watch him obtain Jasmin's hand. Aladdin has a bag full of diamonds that he took from the Cave of Wonders to pay off the money-hungry Empress and I gladly overlook everything else that is objectionable about him in my enthusiasm for the diamonds.

See, there is one thing for me to smile about in this panto and that is the thought of being able to buy more shoes with all of those diamonds! Unfortunately, right at the moment when there seems to be a happy ending, Abanazar appears once again with his Slave and freezes everyone. He takes Jasmine and her handmaiden captive, steals the diamonds from me (oh no!), grabs the lamp and disappears. When the freezing charm wears off, we are all in a frenzy to find the stolen items. Aladdin, accompanied by Wishy (who happens to be in love with Ting Ming by this time) and Widow Twanky (who has set her heart on the diamonds too) take the magic carpet and follow Abanazar back to his lair to try and rescue the damsels in distress.

Meanwhile, in Abanazar's lair, the evil man has rubbed the lamp and begun obtaining his three wishes from the Genie. First he wants to become a Prince, but upon being rejected by Jasmine, he decides to become a king (supposedly more impressive). Again, in true British panto humor, upon making this wish, Abanazar dons an Elvis Presley wig and dances around to an Elvis song. (I know, it's obvious humor, but they love that here!) The Genie then tricks Abanazar into wasting his last wish (by wishing that all his other wishes were undone) and all he can do after that is hide the lamp and hope that he can outwit Aladdin some other way.

However, as you might imagine, Aladdin and his friends arrive at the lair. They are captured by Abanazar, but are able to outwit him in the end. Aladdin finds the lamp, rubs it, uses his second wish to free all the prisoners and after he sings 'A whole new world with Jasmine', they all escape on the flying carpet. What happens to Abanazar? Well, he is turned into Widow Twanky's assistant in the laundrette by the Slave (after all, her two boys are getting married) and Aladdin then uses his final wish to free the slave and the Genie from their imprisonments. Happy ending all around! Of course, I've left out a lot in this narration, but you have the basic idea of the plot. There is a lot more goofing around with the humor than I have been able to portray here.

Here are David and I taking our final bows in the finale scene. If you look very closely at David's hat, you will see that it has a hatchet stuck in the side. That was our costume designer's wacky way of conveying the idea that this man was a hen-pecked husband. Again, British humor. I had a great time participating in this panto and am so grateful to have these kinds of memories to look back on! They will always be priceless and special.

I thought you might be interested in the process of putting on my face-paint, so below you will see a couple of stages of it:

Stage one-- putting the gold foundation on and the red eye shadow.

Stage two: putting in the black and red stripes. Stage three was putting on the white dots, putting on the fake eyelashes, and putting on the lipstick, but I didn't take a picture of that part because I figured you see the finished face in the panto pictures.

Many of you know that I work at St. Bede's Pastoral Centre and my employers are a community of nuns. These women are fabulous and we have come to be good friends. One of them decided that I was looking a bit worn out and needed a retreat. Therefore, I was sent out to the community's Retreat Cottage on the Whitby Coast for a few days at the end of February. After completing my fourth chapter, I went out there to give the place a deep clean, but also to 'get away' from academics. So . . . here are my pictures from that excursion. I loved it! Just look at that coast line. Who wouldn't love a few days there, even in February? I could have stayed longer!

Here is the Retreat Cottage. It's at the very end of the North Promenade and is just across the road from the cliffs that lead down to the beach you saw above. Talk about a prime piece of property! Anyway, inside this 'cottage' there are nine bedrooms, three sitting rooms, a laundry room, four bathrooms, a large kitchen, and several pantries. There is also a garage out back and a lovely garden too. I occupied the upper room with the bow window on the left. It was lovely!

Great name for the cottage, ey? I thought it was perfect for a community of nuns.

Here I am at the door. Next to me on the left is a large pot with some spring bulbs just coming up! After these long, dark, winter nights that they have in England, I'm always happy to feel the first stirrings of spring.

Below you will see my bedroom with it's bow window overlooking the sea. You can't ask for more than this if you want a quiet place to recover from the mental exhaustion of finishing a chapter! If you look closely at the top of the bed you can see my yellow rubber gloves. Yes, I did do the cleaning I was sent there to do!

Here I am at the bow window. I had nice scripture study sessions at this desk each of the two mornings I had there. Because of a pantomime rehearsal, I had to go back to York a bit earlier than I had hoped and had to give up my last morning out there. Oh well, it was all for a good cause.

This is one of the many paths leading down from the road onto the beach. As you can see, they are very steep, but since they are paved, it's not too bad to go up and down them.

Here's another view of the beach and the pier and so forth. I did have one partly cloudy day when the sun came out for a while. This was one of the gray days that are typical of English weather.

Here I am out enjoying the beach between cleaning sessions. The weather was still cold, but at least it wasn't blowing or raining or anything like that. I enjoyed my walks out here. So did a few other people.

How could I not take a picture of the lighthouse? This one isn't all that colorful to look at, but I'm sure it does its job.

There was a body surfer out in the sea at the time I was down here. He was wearing a wet suit, of course, but I was amazed that he was surfing the waves at this time of year. Not being much for swimming in the ocean, I can't relate to his enthusiasm, but he sure looked like he was enjoying himself.