The Little Mermaid Blog
Hi there fellow land-dwellers, and welcome to this week’s The Little Mermaid blog! My name’s Ellie and I’ll be taking you through what we’ve been getting up to this week, our FINAL REHEARSAL WEEK before curtain up… eek!
I say fellow land-dwellers because this year I have the absolute delight of being part of the chorus – a first for me in SMP panto and it’s been such a treat! That means that whilst I am not a mermaid I do get to play various different roles: so many, in fact, that I have seven costume changes in Act 1 alone!
Doing chorus in panto is so much fun as you get lots to do and are involved in all the big production numbers. It’s been lovely to dust off my dancing shoes at rehearsals with our choreographer extraordinaire, Jo Bakhurst, who has put us through our paces with lots of exciting, high energy and creative routines.
The team have chosen a great selection of songs this year, and we have been ably guided through learning them by our superstar MD, Mike Benyon, who has made us promise that we will remember to sing our harmonies properly even once we have all our costumes on and are spinning around on stage. Speaking of costumes, I have to give a huge shout out to our costume ladies – Fay, Ellie and Debbie – who have really outdone themselves this show. We’re so colourful and sparkly, and it’ll look even better under stage lights!
Both Monday and Wednesday nights this week saw us running the show from start to finish under the watchful eyes of our production dream-team, the final member of which is Michael Lacey, making his directorial debut. Not that you’d know it’s his debut: he’s done an incredible job and should be very proud of the finished product (disclaimer: he may be my best friend, but he hasn’t actually paid me to say that).
The whole team have put in an insane amount of hard work. Running the show twice this week has allowed us to iron out any bumps and the show really is looking fabulous. As usual the script, written by Warren McWilliams, is flawless, packed with hilarious fish-related puns that the whole family will enjoy and laugh at for weeks to come (he did pay me to say that).
I often get a little bit emotional at our final rehearsal before show week – I know, loser – but it’s so rewarding to see all of the hard work pay off and to see the production team happy.
On that note, I need to go and start ironing my costumes before we get into the theatre on Sunday – if I start now I should be done by then! Make sure you don’t miss out on this one: see you at The Intimate Theatre NEXT WEEK!
You can book your tickets here:
