Robin Hood and the Seven Dwarfs la Spectaculaire A Critique

It is indeed a rare occasion when you are invited to a glittering 'First Night Spectacular' at the theatre, met within the foyer by the theatre management team, and then accompanied to the best seat in the house. Canapes, followed by an ice-cold gin and tonic at the interval, all this without the need to push through hundreds of theatre fans. Afterwards to be ushered back to your private box to enjoy a wonderous finale. Finally, an invitation to sip champagne in the dressing room, as the personal and exclusive guest of the star of the show. Well, last night’s showing of "Robin Hood and his Seven Dwarfs A La Spectaculaire" was no exception!

I was offered a complimentary bag of pork scratchings and was asked for my credit card details in order to pay for my ticket.

The plot, and I use the term advisedly, performed by the 'Widnes and District Ladies Rugby League Club, better known as the 'Knicker Kickers', bore no resemblance whatsoever to the stories of the gallant "Sir Robin of Loxley" only insofar as "Robin" sported a very natty Lincoln Green leotard together with a very apparent 48G tabard in Day-Glo fluorescent orange, the words "Motorway Maintenance" on her back did little, I feel, to remind us of our latter day hero.

Doris Cockermouth, who when she's not playing scrum half for the seconds, plays the part of Robin Hood. I must say she was unbelievable; in fact I think it only fair to say that Doris’s portrayal of our good Robin of Sherwood was totally unbelievable throughout the whole evening.

When not playing full back for the first team Pixie Dimple can be found with the local veterinary helping out with the castration of bulls and the gelding of shire horses. ‘She’s a natural, took to it like a duck to water’, says local vet Teddy Stitchtit.  As it turned out Pixie’s portrayal of Little John was an all action tour de force in her Lincoln green Tae Kwondo outfit as she was happy to punch and kick at anything and anybody throughout the performance.

Maid Marion! well somebody must have, made her that is! I have not seen anything to compare with Wigan's full back, Cytherea Ballscaut's performance of Robin's fair lady since the late John Hurt's stomach ulcer ran amok in 'The Alien'.

Now we, all of us, love a little mystery, but perhaps someone could enlighten me as to why during the middle of such an epic disaster, seven dwarfs, (I counted at least eleven, played by the children of the W.D.L.R. LC., burst from the Greenwood, which incidentally was kindly supplied by Sylvester Bentfinger, director of the Wigan Parks and Greens Dept.

The dwarfs, such as they were, proceeded to fire little arrows with suckers into the audience, very nearly blinding the front row, whilst at the same time screaming from the tops of their raucous voices the lead song from 'Oliver'....'Food Glorious Food’???

The scenery and backdrop however proved most interesting as much of the "Greenwood" seemed to consist of rubber tree plants, a whole array of exotic orchids and tropical ferns. Also half a dozen odd boxes of over ripe bananas and pineapples from the local Lidl, more reminiscent of a market scene from "Miss Saigon" than that of Sherwood Forest.

Let me tell you that if I knew that the line "lets burn the bastards out!" delivered by a lusty, if not busty Sheriff of Nottingham, played by the tall but never elegant Elvira Pickles, second fifteen coach and part time masseuse, would end the evening so abruptly after only four and a half hours thus far, I would gladly have supplied the matches myself.

As it was, the stage went up like Dantes Inferno, dwarves could be seen running and screaming in all directions like short roman candles. 

A finale not unlike that of the Dresden Blitz.

As the final curtain came down, together with much of the ornate corrugated roofing the show was immediately upstaged by the noisy arrival of the Warrington and Winnick Fire Brigade who had come hot foot from the close by Winnick Village Hall, many of the firemen arriving in full make up and dressed as Japanese school girls. They too had been treading the boards and under the illusion, due to the bright footlights, that they were playing to a full house of village pensioners. The fire fighters to a man had been enacting their own version of the age-old Gilbert and Sullivan favourite

'The Mikado and the Forty Thieves'.

The lad’s immediate departure of the stage going almost unnoticed by the dozen or so members of the village over Eighties Fun and Frolic Club who were sat together with the Winnick Wanderers Blind Golfers.

" It was damn lucky that I had my beeper with me", said Leading Fireman Nanki Poo Roberts - as he continued to extinguish and pat down a still smoldering, but panting Hilda Gofaster, aka (Friar Tuck) on the back seat of her car.

Like they say.

All’s well that ends well!

End