He played the dame at Drury Lane for sixteen year and his performance as Mother Goose strongly influenced the role of dame from then on.
There really is nothing like a dame. As characters in the commedia wore masks that were instantly recognisable to audiences who were familiar with that character, the elaborately painted face of a pantomime dame acts almost as a mask in the same way — we see a picture of a pantomime dame and even without being told we immediately know what character we are looking at.
Originally the pantomime dame could be played by either a man or a woman and the tradition of the pantomime dame being played by man was not cemented until the end of the s when performers such as Dan Leno elevated the role. Interestingly today we are seeing the re-emergence of the female dame, in particular there is a small but growing trend for the Ugly Sisters to be played by females rather than males.
Although women had played breeches parts for around two hundred years, this was not a device commonly employed in pantomime until the mids and this was because until the decline of the harlequinade there were no suitable roles available. In Victorian era England standards of propriety were so high that even the legs of a piano had to be covered. Whereas women in general were forced to wear large uncomfortable floor length dresses a woman on the stage was allowed to show her legs on the proviso she was playing a male role.
This gave panto an additional appeal to anyone keen for a rare sighting of female legs! There is much debate as to who can be classed as the first female principal boy in panto. Many would argue it was Eliza Povey in playing Jack in the first ever pantomime version of Jack and the Beanstalk who should be awarded this moniker, however she did not also play Harlequin nor would she climb the beanstalk which reached from the stage floor up to the roof.
Instead a lad whose job it was to fetch water for horses at the coach station was deemed a suitable double to climb the beanstalk each night and apparently this doubling was never once spotted by the public! Because of this Madame Celeste is sometimes put forward as being the first true pantomime principal boy for her appearance as both Jack and Harlequin in Jack and the Beanstalk in However, it was really the music hall stars such as Vesta Tilley and Marie Lloyd in the s that cemented the popularity of a female principal boy.
The female principal boy faced a decline in the s and 60s as male stars from the music and television world started to take over the role, beginning with Norman Wisdom playing Aladdin at the London Palladium and he was followed by others such as Cliff Richard, Frankie Vaughan, Engelbert Humperdinck and Jimmy Tarbuck. This trend was reversed in the 70s when Cilla Black took to the Palladium stage as Aladdin in However, over the last two decades we have once more witnessed the decline of the female principal boy.
Something once integral to a good pantomime were the skin characters. Originally any actor could be called upon to play a skin character, even Henry Irving played a wolf early in his career in Little Bo-Peep.
These skin performers were once so popular it became a speciality which reached its pinnacle in the mid nineteenth century and one of the most famous skin actors was George Conquest who went far beyond the regular cow, cat and goose we think of today, once performing as an octopus in a suit that measured twenty-eight feet across.
Although animals still appear in pantomime today the true specialists have almost died away as there is no longer a call for them for the rest of the year and the roles have reverted back to regular actors and members of the ensemble.
A former clerk in the wool-trade industry Francis built the Alhambra in Bradford at the height of the popularity of the variety show which was the successor to the music hall and produced pantomime for half a century throughout the UK.
In the s and s one of the biggest names in pantomime production was Derek Salberg who oversaw numerous successful productions from the Alexandra Theatre in Birmingham. Although he employed well known people and speciality acts his pantomimes allowed the inclusion, not intrusion, of these performers, with the emphasis of the production being on its strong storyline.
The pantomimes we see today contain characters, plot devises and routines developed over a few hundred years. Although panto has changed considerably over the last few hundred years one thing that has not changed is its financial importance to the theatre industry and its popularity amongst the general public. Although not a fan of pantomime David Garrick came to realise as far back as just how crucial they were to the survival of the theatre industry when having resisted for as long as he could Boxing Day of that year saw him accept that he needed to give the public what they wanted and he produced his first pantomime.
From this point on Drury Lane was home to one of the most spectacular pantomimes in the country with a small fortune being spent to ensure it was the best show in town each Christmas. It also helped cement the tradition of pantomimes being performed at Christmas as Garrick held the view that if he really had to do them he would associate them with the frivolity of the Christmas season, rather than with the theatre itself.
Pantomime spread outwards from London to theatres all over the United Kingdom and now almost all regional theatres have a pantomime or some sort of Christmas show playing during December. During s panto gradually faded from being an offering of the major West End playhouses who instead started to house long running block-buster musicals. However, recent years have seen panto return to the West End with the annual panto at the Palladium.
Arlechino later Harlequin and Columbina. Why are pantomimes at Christmas? Why is pantomime so popular? What makes pantomime valuable? What are the stock characters in a pantomime? What is a synonym for pantomime? What are plays without words called?
What is the opposite of pantomime? What is another name for periscope? The twelve days of Christmas would have been a most welcome break for the workers on the land, which in Tudor times would have been the majority of the people. Pantomime is a marvellous and wonderful if a little eccentric!
British institution. An example of audience participation: Wicked Queen in the pantomime version of Snow White. So how did this curious British institution come about?
Pantomime often provides young children with their first glimpse of live theatre, so its easy to see why it holds a nostalgic place in many of our hearts. Taking place at Christmas time in venues from Village Halls to iconic theatres with vast capacities, the Pantomime is for everyone. Join us as we take a look at the history of Pantomime. Even though we think of the Pantomime as a distinctly British Christmas love, it actually has its roots in Italian street theatre of the 16th Century. Key characters were Columbine, a girl in love with naughty servant Arlecchino, Pierrot the clown and old man Pantalone.
Many plots from the Commedia centred around the triumph of the underdog, which would go on to be a popular feature in Pantomimes. This is thought to have inspired the Tudor era tradition of the Feast of Fools in which a commoner would be selected as Lord of Misrule to preside over a decadent and raucous banquet during which gender role reversal was encouraged.
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