Well, its the fag-end of the panto season, so a play about a panto dame seems perfectly timely, much more so than its first outing at the Edinburgh fringe. Katie Duncan has written this monologue for her father Peter and it’s the perfect vehicle for his talents and experiences.
Panto dame Roy returns to his dressing room after the performance, in a theatre somewhere in the north. He’s undressing and removing make-up, talking directly to the audience most of the time. As he does, he looks back at both his own life and that of his profession, talking about his heroes. the clown Grimaldi, Dan Leno and Charlie Chaplin. His mum died when he was a child and he was brought up and put on stage by his bullying dad. We hear tales of seaside entertainments as well as panto.
Duncan is probably best known for Blue Peter, but he started at the National, has a significant body of stage work and this is a virtuoso performance, expertly staged by Ian Talbot. It moves between funny, nostalgic and poignant, occasionally uncomfortable or embarrassing. It’s more of a fictional memoir than a play, but I admired the artistry, it kept my attention and it didn’t outstay its welcome at just 60 minutes.
Gareth's Culture and Travel Blog 
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