All you need to know about JW3’s first panto
It's the festival of light. Little Red Riding Hood’s village needs affordable energy. This is Nick Cassenbaum's inspired Chrismakah show for all the family
It’s no secret that pantomime is the most British form of theatre. But a communal release at the end of the year that brings the family together to sing, shout and laugh… does anything sound more Jewish to you?
It has been a tradition of mine to go to my local panto every year at The Hackney Empire. To me, this show represents a local panto at its best; no matter what, there’s something there for everyone to enjoy and resonate with, BUT if it’s local to you, it’s something special.
My child is two now. When he was six months old I took him to panto for the first time. For the half he was awake, his eyes did not leave the stage. As I looked at him and around the theatre I saw generations of families there together. It reminded me of going to see Cilla Black as Jack, in Jack and the Beanstalk featuring Spit the Dog at the Palladium with my grandparents. I thought I would love to write something that my child remembers when he takes his child to the theatre in years to come.
A year or so later JW3 asked me to write its first pantomime. I jumped at the chance. The chance to make a show that Jewish families could come together and laugh at. I wanted to do exactly what Hackney Empire does so well…but for my community. To create a pantomime that felt like a ‘local’ panto but for all Jews in London. There are jokes and lines I hope resonate with everyone, be they frum, secular, Ashkenazi, Sephardi or Mizrahi, from North West London or Essex
But this isn’t the first time I’ve had a go at writing a Jewish panto. When I was a teenage cheder teacher at my shul, South Woodford Progressive (now East London and Essex Liberal), I joined forces with fellow teacher James to write its first Purim Spiel panto. It had all the trappings of proper pantomime starting with Cinderella, Haman as the evil classic villain and the comic double act of two assassins trying to kill the king.
I stood at the back of the shul watching kids and parents performing on the bimah, the congregation laughing. It was the first time I’d ever had one of my plays performed and there was no going back from there. I was ready and waiting for the challenge.
What to me is quintessentially Jewish and runs through lots of families is strong women. That’s why in Little Red Riding Hood and the Big Bad Pig, I was inspired to have at the centre of the story three generations of strong Jewish women. It’s all up to Little Red, her mum (our Dame) Mother Hoodman and Red’s Granny – bubbeh – to save Chanukah.
Of course the villain is a Pig, a pig whose origin story is one of the three little pigs and he is now an evil energy baron, and our wolf, Pig’s henchman- not really big or bad, but a neurotic aspiring vegetarian. All of these are going to be played by our phenomenal cast including stage and screen legend, Debbie Chazen. Along with Gemma Barnett, Lauren Silver, Tiago Fonseca and Josh Glancy with Abi Anderson directing.
It has been so much fun thinking up this story and where I can be so explicitly Jewish in a form full of jokes (I have some great puns around a rat and a ketubah which I am particularly proud of), that allows the audience to respond and sing along. And we hope people will sing along with a score of rewritten classics made famous by Jewish artists from Barbra Streisand, Pete Burns and Charlie Puth to Amy Winehouse, Craig David and Neil Sedaka. There’s going to be something for everyone. I am beyond excited by the team we have assembled and can’t wait for people to come and have a good night out – Hackney Empire-style, but at JW3.
Little Red Riding Hood and the Big Bad Pig is at JW3 from 10 December to 7 January https://www.jw3.org.uk/
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