York Theatre to January 5, 2025
Tickets from $59 at 604-251-1363 or www.thecultch.com
Posted November 23, 2024
Did I go to the opening of the East Van Panto: Robin Hood last night? “Oh, yes I did!” And was I disappointed? “Oh, no I wasn’t!” I and hundreds of others had a rambunctious, rollicking good time shouting out advice like, “Look behind you” or admonitions like, “No, you won’t”. As always in the panto, Veda Hille on keyboard (with percussionist June Mirochnick) kicks the show off; no theatre ever or anywhere has a more creative and entertaining acknowledgement of donors as the breakneck musical intro that Hille does (differently) every year followed by, “Here we are. And here we go!”
East Van Panto: Robin Hood, written by Jivesh Parasram and Christine Quintana, marks the 12th annual collaboration between Theatre Replacement (Vancouver) and the Cultch, and the second year for this writing team. Last year’s panto played on Mr. Mattress, the long-standing East Van mattress company; this year it’s all about Prince Ken (a thinly-veiled portrait Vancouver’s mayor Ken Sim), Robin Hood and Tony The Pony, as the prince’s henchman (hench-pony?)
The madcap plot revolves around a bunch of forest creatures that find, to their dismay, that Prince Ken has fenced and locked Lululemon Park (formerly Trout Lake Park) and they now have to pay to get in. Vancouver has become, under Prince Ken, “a city for everyone – who is rich and cool.” The animals aren’t rich and must find a way to steal the key to get back in. Robin Hood leads his Merry-Thems to the Vancouver Public Library where Marion The Librarian helps them find books to give them some ideas. Robin stumbles across The Iliad, reads about the Trojan Horse and a plan emerges to steal some of Vancouver’s public art, stash it in a wooden horse, steal the key to Lululemon Park and live happily ever after in East Van. Thwarting them at every turn is Tony The Pony (originally the Sheriff of Nottingham).
Credit: Emily Cooper
Yep, it’s crazy. And it’s fun – although not so much if you happen to be Vancouver’s mayor. Barbs are aimed at Prince Ken for “pumping, pumping, pumping” in his private gym; cracks are made about the imperilled Parks Board (“We ain’t got no Parks Board”) and cutting down the trees in Stanley Park. The word “swagger” – a word Mayor Sim uses to describe the Vancouver he hopes to create during his tenure – crops up repeatedly. This panto is as much about Prince Ken as it is about Robin Hood and it pays to have some idea about what’s going on in City Hall. This all goes merrily over the heads of the kids in the audience, of course.
Under the direction of Anita Rochon, with a set design by Lauchlin Johnston and lighting design by Sophie Tang, the York stage is just packed with talent. Jason Sakaki, doubling as Prince Ken and Marion The Librarian, is so spot-on silly; as the prince (all in white and wearing fabulous Fluevog shoes trimmed in gold), he twists his long black hair and alternates between simpering and menacing. As Marion, he’s nerdy and bespectacled. Sakaki can, and does, get huge laughs with just a sideways glance. Steffanie Davis – she of the amazing, roof-raising voice – is a snide and jeering Tony The Pony in a police uniform and hat but with black leather or rubber hooves instead of hands. Davis is wickedly funny when she gets turned on by the Trojan horse.
Hayley Sullivan makes an engaging Australian-accented Robin Hood; the Australian connection is played up later in a transformation that I’m still puzzling over. Transgender? Transform? Identity politics at play?
The always funny Mark Chavez is Hans The Hedgehog, Luz The Goose and a robotic librarian, Robobrarian, after Prince Ken replaces the library staff with robots. Spectacular shiny, metallic, studded costumes on Chavez and three of the Panto Kids, are just a few of Alaia Hamer’s amazingly creative designs for this show. Munish Sharma, busting some impressive moves, is Little Jaan, Robin’s bestie.
A production crew of almost twenty, including choreographer Amanda Testini, a cast of nearly a dozen plus all the Panto kids, twenty five songs (from Jolene to Video Killed The Radio Star and everything in between, with all new lyrics masterminded by the amazing Hille) make this a huge, colourful, rowdy show. How did Vancouver get so lucky as to have Hille and Theatre Replacement resident here?
Robin Hood: The Panto is Theatre Replacement and the Cultch’s gift to Vancouver, a cherished, made-in-East-Van tradition and a real antidote to dark, rainy, westcoast weather. It’s the first time, however, that I remember a political figure so singly skewered, albeit it in fun. I’ll bet it’s not the gift Mayor Sim asked Santa to put under his Christmas (Seasonal Holiday?) tree.