By Mike Renzella | The Haldimand Press
December 14, 2023
PORT COLBORNE — If your holiday season has been light on laughter so far, you should run, not walk, to Port Colborne’s Roselawn Theatre and catch Lighthouse Festival’s first-ever holiday pantomime production, Jack and the Beanstalk, before its final show runs on December 17.
The Panto is an interesting experiment for Lighthouse. Setting the tone immediately, the show actively encourages audience participation, with characters interacting directly with those off the stage and music cues telling the audience to boo the villain, throw out ridiculous animal calls, yell advice to characters, and sing along with those on stage.
It’s a truly fun and unique evening that is sure to please the younger crowd with bright sets, inventive lighting, and over-the-top costumes and performances, while the older crowd is sure to enjoy the show’s onslaught of zingers. The talented cast is game for all the silliness, bringing affable charm to their over-the-top caricatures.
As Jack, Eliza-Jane Scott brings a snot-nosed, Bart Simpson-esque energy to the classic role of the boy duped into selling his cow for a bag of magic beans. His mother, Dame, played by Sal Figliomeni in a tour-de-force performance with no less than 10 impressive costume changes, shines in a role designed to wring every single laugh possible out of the premise of an aging Italian man playing a female protagonist.
If you’ve seen Disney’s animated Robin Hood movie, then you’ll recognize that movie’s snively king in Allan Cooke’s performance as he plays, well, a snively king. With the role, Cooke adds another memorable comedic character to his long and impressive list of Lighthouse performances, having most recently been seen as one of a pair of bumbling thugs in the theatre’s summer-ending show ‘A Pack of Thieves’.
As the aptly named Villain, Cyrus Lane brings a 1930s gangster, scene-chewing energy to a hilariously over-the-top depiction of corporate greed in his Lighthouse debut. His desire to tear down farmland and replace it with “condos, condos, condos as far as the eye can see” seems tailor-made to get Haldimand Norfolk residents booing him with gusto from their seats.
We would be remiss not to mention Stephen Ingram, the show’s Music Director and on-stage narrator. Ingram wanders in and out of the show amiably, always singing a catchy song, and he keeps the show moving at a brisk pace, playing the keyboard with ease and adding musical flair to the show’s sharp comedy.
Director Jonathan Ellul keeps everything moving at a frantic pace, and although the actions unfolding onstage are undeniably silly, the show itself is well-paced and well-produced, shined to a polish. Every sound cue hits right on time, with backstage rimshots aplenty timed to the show’s many intentionally silly dad jokes, and the show has a lot of visual creativity on display, including the titular beanstalk which impressively rises to the rafters to end the show’s first half.
It’s easy to see why Lighthouse Artistic Director Derek Ritschel has been pumping up this production all year. It really is a great, local option for families looking for something to do together during the holidays, and we hope this year’s inaugural panto is just the first in a new local tradition to cherish.
For tickets and more information, visit lighthousetheatre.com.
After studying journalism at Humber College, Mike Renzella desired to write professionally but found himself working in technical fields for many years. Beginning in 2019 as a freelancer, he joined the team full-time later that year. Since then, Mike has won several awards for his articles thanks to his commitment to presenting an unbiased, honest look at the important news and events shaping our community.