Theatre Royal Stratford East, London
Afrobeat-tinged music, an AI love interest, Elon Musk as a panto villain, and a cast who are clearly having a ball mean there is something for everyone in this flashy festive show
Elon Musk as a pantomime villain? That’s a sight with which we’re all familiar. But panto villain as Elon Musk? Maybe that’s a first for Vikki Stone and Tonderai Munyevu’s Christmas show, which doesn’t stint on satirical sideswipes – nor, I am happy to report, on boisterous festive fun. Musk makes his appearance spooking our three heroes when they hijack a rocket at SpaceX to rescue Gary the Goose from interstellar (for some reason) captivity. Formerly owned by the good fairy WTF, he has been birdnapped by her frenemy BFF – and if those two are giving strong Glinda and Elphaba vibes, well, I don’t think it’s a coincidence.
There’s something to savour everywhere you look, starting with Duane Gooden’s haughty West African dame, who “puts the tit in titular”. She is queen of all she surveys here, as both the protagonist whose journey to the dark side of consumerist self-absorption and back forms the spine of the story, and the ad-libber whose backchat with the crowd supplies many of its liveliest moments. We also get Ché Walker flapping around as the golden egg-laying goose, like some ghost of Cockney Christmases past. And a pair of young sweethearts, principal boy Jack and his cyber inamorata, whose mutual attraction is gleefully sent up (“I know you’re a bot / But I like you a lot”) and thoroughly loveable at the same time.
