CHEAP and wonderfully cheerful are just two of the reasons why this year's panto at the Belfast Arts Theatre is all but sold out for its entire seven-week run. But there's more.
Writer-director Peter Quigley has done rather an audacious job in keeping, more or less, to the familiar plot while introducing a curiously unexpected anti-bloodsport message.
On paper, the very notion seems more than a little bizarre but, on stage, it allows for a splendid hunt ball, a cute scene between Cinders and a frightened fox, and a moral conflict - personified by the Prince and his gloating side-kick Dan Deeney - that should put us off our Christmas turkey ... but probably won't.
Add to that the kind of brilliant team effort that we've come to take for granted from the assembled talents of Jules Maxwell - music, Caroline McCullough - set and costume design, Aidan Lacey - lighting, plus collectively bright, clear performances from the attractive cast and great sing-along music straight out of the pop charts ... and the formula for success is complete.
Paddy Jenkins as Buttons has made a huge leap in confidence since his professional debut in Beauty and the Beast last year and, from the moment the curtain goes up, has his young audiences eating out of his hand.
Alan McKee and Feargal McElherron are as grotesque a double-act as you will come across as Big Milly and Wee Frilly; pretty Suzanne Davids cleverly avoids the usual saccharine portrait of poor misused Cinders; while Andy Charal is given the perfect opportunity for his flamboyant performance gifts, making the transformation from wizened old hag to a neon-costumed, hippy, Hairy Godfather, oozing peace and love, man.
