Peter Pan-sexual at the London Palladium
It's crude. Oh not it isn't, oh yes it bloody well is.
So, it’s happened. I’ve become one of those people who shout at pantos. (Oh, no you’re not! Yes, I really am). And I don’t mean all that enjoyable boisterous shouting ‘he’s behind you,’ that’s delightful in its silliness. In fact, Peter Pan at the Palladium failed to involve the audience much at all; it was too busy admiring itself in the mirror. There was one energetic mash-up of I Am What I Am and Born This Way, by Tinkerbell, the thwarted wannabe gay lover of Peter Pan. It was sung with the sort of self-regard and narcissism that Sam Smith can barely dream of. Mind you, ‘Tinks’ was clearly blinded by biceps, as Peter Pan himself had as much personality as a broken desk lamp, albeit one who could do those high, sideway kick things adored by musical theatre.
Elsewhere we had fading stars, as is the career graveyard of panto, staring so hard at their pay cheque they could barely recall their lines. Julian Clary’s costumes apparently consumed an equally large part of the budget and were as delightfully OTT as you’d expect, and there were a few well timed bangs. However, the script was MIA. Obviously, pantomime scripts are expected to be self-referential about the lack of a plot, but there wasn’t any story whatsoever, in fact Jennifer Saunders and Clary blatantly laughed at how they were filling in time. The problem was that the joke was on the audience, with the cast even mocking the crowd for the exorbitant ticket price, and how little they were getting in return. Parents and grandparents and children laughed somewhat obligingly along to increasingly smutty and inappropriate jokes of the ‘well hasn’t he got a big one!’ variety.
Gary Wilmot was the dame, although it was unclear if anyone in the audience could recall why he was a household name. No one seemed to know who he was, and it’s not entirely clear that he did. The only open goal joke they failed to make was one about Peter Pan-sexual. And the only moment of self-reflection appears when Clary suggests JM Barrie will be rolling in his grave. In fact, most of the ‘jokes’ about flaps, etc were going over the under 10s heads, to be more gratefully received by the gay members of the audience.
It was the most low rent, smutty parade of progressive identity politics imaginable. Worst of all was how it demeaned gay men, who are presented as sex obsessed, gag pursuing (yes, there was a joke about gagging on blowjobs), innuendo merchants. In fact, most of the gay puns if told by a straight man would be rightfully criticised as Dad jokes. And when was it deemed acceptable to be laughing at Clary’s strap-on in front of young children? Obviously there’s digs at Nigel Farage and the evil Tories, but no matter what your views on Farage, he isn’t inflicting relentless smut upon an audience of children hoping for something more playful than dildo jokes. They sing ‘everyone is welcome in Neverland’, apart from anyone who opposes open borders and mass immigration.
I’m aware that I sound like a stick-in-the-mud, that getting red-faced over a panto is like complaining about the home-crowd being too loud celebrating a winning goal. But the most disturbing thing was Nigel Havers, the only apparent heterosexual on stage, who was cruelly mocked for being old, past it and ready to made into glue following the knackers yard. His pubic humiliation felt almost sacrificial, and who knows, perhaps he has amends to be made, but it was as dark as it wasn’t funny. There was no redemption for him; he was mocked without mercy until the bitter end.
Obviously you don’t attend pantos for insights into the human condition, but it certainly reflected a modern shallowness, and so-called progressive agenda that seems obsessed with sex. Most upsetting was that the female chorus line appeared to have been invaded by gay men, with the girls wearing tunics to bind their breasts to appear more like their male interlopers. The only genuinely funny segments were the ventriloquist Paul Zerdin and his puppets who seemed to have more heart that the entire cast put together.
Paul O’Grady received an almost heartwarming mention when Clary says ‘A year ago he sent me a card wishing me a warm hand on my opening, although these days I probably need two.’ Time spent upset at a West End panto might be equally wasted on wishing the Pink Panther wasn’t pink; it’s supposed to be vulgar and crude, but this felt nothing more than grotty. It’s greatest crime, other than blatant ageism and cruelty, was that it wasn’t particularly funny or entertaining, just lazy and obnoxious. Mind you, with the guffaws of some audience members, perhaps panto is no longer for kids, but a sort of ironic statement for gay men to enjoy.
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How sad.
And I assume some royalties from this production will go to Gt Ormond St Children’s Hospital which makes the content even more worrying.
Good piece do utterly depressing
Panto when well done is joyful
Last years st Royal court in Liverpool was a riot surreal and we laughed our sox off. Few innuendos but mostly just hilarious