British Pantomine in Venice

 

For those of you who may have been following my wife's blog which has recently been focusing on the pantomime she wrote, directed, and produced here, I thought I'd provide to you my completely unbiased perspective.

It had three sellout performances last week (sellout meaning full house as a donation to a church was the entry fee).

First of all, you American readers should not confuse British Pantomime with any of that tediously boring and noiseless schtick of Marcel Marceau. British Panto is filled with noise: cheering, booing, singing, dance, hissing, laughter and melodrama. With Marceau one occasionally may smile but then look at one's watch.

Laurie's panto was Mother Goose, a stock character in the panto world. It had some Venetian threads to it. The venue was our local theatre at Santa Margherita (capacity 320). I am not sure of the historical underpinnings of panto, but there are similarities between it and Italian Commedia dell'arte (standard characters, exaggerated language, behaviour and costumes, music, corny and witty jokes) so our Venetian audience was not totally at sea. The majority of the audience, however, were British and American, mostly expats and tourists, and some who travelled here for the show.

There is a university here in Venice and the University English department agreed to sponsor the venue (we still paid about €800) with the expectation that an English show would be of interest to its students. Hah! The university English department here is quite large but those who came to the show were a handful. Not unexpected. Being a student here means passing tests, spending time in bars and not attending cultural events which are surplus to getting through. Although, full credit to some headmistresses of local grammar schools who brought about two hundred 9 to 13 year olds to the morning performance. (My next blog will talk about university students here in Venice.)    

The panto was a huge success, critically and financially (€1800 to the beneficiciary, St George's Anglican Church Roof Fund). The actors were superb, the direction excellent, the costumes, dance and music were grand. Brava Laurie!

Laurie says never again, but she said that three years ago.