Credit: Emily Cooper
At the York Theatre until January 5, 2020
Tickets from $26 at thecultch.com or 604-251-1363
Posted November 23, 2019
Jiminy Pattison (yes, you read it correctly) is a 91-year-old half-man, half-cricket in the East Van Panto: Pinocchio. Gotta love it. Better yet, Jiminy Pattison becomes Pinocchio’s ‘Conscience Counsellor’, guiding the puppet who would be a real boy along the path of goodness. That path has many obstacles along the way that tempt Pinocchio from the straight and narrow but Jiminy eventually prevails: “What makes you real is how you treat your friends.” Words to live by.
In this year’s show, written by Marcus Youssef and directed by Stephen Drover for Theatre Replacement and The Cultch, there are no sacred cows; plenty of light-hearted skewering goes on from Pattison to Doug Ford (who is the really, really bad guy luring the kids to the Hastings Racetrack) and Justin Trudeau (who is his usual I’m-so-woke guy in his trademark white shirt, rolled sleeves: “My privilege made me do it.”)
Naomi Wright, rigged out in layered, ragged, ethnic gear is Beckwoman – a Commercial Drive fixture – and she’s hilarious, scrabbling around looking for stuff to sell or recycle. Perhaps better known for her Bard on the Beach performances, Wright is a knockout in all the roles she plays in the Panto, including a selfie and Instagram addict who, like, uses ‘like’ all the time. Wright finally makes an exit twitching and repeating, “Likelikelikelikelikelike…..”
The Panto begins at the beginning – sort of: Gelato (Shawn Macdonald), an ice-cream vendor is going broke trying to sell baby diaper-flavoured gelato. But he has this big wooden puppet and thinks maybe he can make a living doing puppet shows. He drags the puppet out and asks the audience, “What shall I call him” and some dear little soul shouts out, “Pinocchio”. (Good lord, she might have said Andrew Scheer and then where would the show have gone?) Gelato tells us he longs for a son, a real boy. And, naturally, Pinocchio wants to become a real boy. But how to get from strings to string-free?
Credit: Emily Cooper
Along comes Fairy Instagram Mother (Chirag Naik) all in pink, purple and orange, rolling in on a hoverboard. The deal? If Pinocchio can get 100,000 Instagram followers, the Fairy Instagram Mother will turn him into a real boy.
Pippa Mackie makes a sweet, engaging Pinocchio: naïve and full of wonder at the world and the possibility of becoming real. Mackie’s body language is perfect: a little puppet-like at the beginning but eventually flesh and blood. She has a great face, too: wide-eyed, just a little dopey, guileless.
Chirak Naik is fantastic in all his roles – and a quick costume-change artist, too. And Amanda Sum is equally good as the super-good Jiminy Pattison and the over-stuffed, red tie-wearing, super-villainous Doug Ford.
Set against Cindy Mochizuki’s painted backdrop – a Commercial Drive corner bearing the sign ‘This Way To Commercial Drive: Where Authenticity Comes To Get Real’ – it seems the Panto has a cast of hundreds but, really, there are only a handful of little kids and eight grown-ups playing everyone from Michael Bublé to Mademoiselle Fox Cabaret, a wickedly sexy redhead in a lowcut satin gown. Barbara Clayden just keeps the crazy costumes coming.
As always, the music is provided by the incomparable, witty and wonderful Veda Hille on keyboard and Barry Mirochnick on percussion. And, as usual, the show features pop songs with re-written lyrics. Outstanding is Shawn Macdonald singing Figaro’s Aria; is there anything Macdonald can’t do? Re-worked songs that everyone will recognize are ABBA’s “Mamma Mia”, “You’re a Mean One, Mr. Grinch” and “YMCA” and a dozen more.
There are bucketsful of candies thrown out for the young ‘uns, wonderful double entendres for the adults, political jabs, local colour (Joe’s Café, Calabria, Café du Soleil, MEC, Fox Cabaret), choreography by Amanda Testini, and so much more. Woven into the Pinocchio story are messages about recycling, micro-plastics, saving the whales, being a good friend – all framed inside a good story.
Best lampoon? Beckwoman wishing us “Good luck in the lobby” at intermission; the York’s lobby is surely the smallest, skinniest lobby with the longest line-ups in town. The good news is that if you’re lucky enough to get to the front of the concession line before the curtain goes up again, you can take whatever it is into the theatre. The show starts at 7PM, runs two hours including a twenty-minute intermission.
Each playwright commissioned by Theatre Replacement to write the Panto gets a two-year kick at the can. The team of Youssef and Drover – in their second of two years – has been terrific. The proof? It takes at least half an hour to get your face back on from all that laughing, hooting and hollering. “Oh yes we did”. “Oh no you didn’t”. “Oh yes we did.”
The Panto always sells out. If you plan to go, buy tickets now.