When we say it’s fun for the whole family, it is in more ways than one.
Mother Goose, which is now playing at Noosa Arts Theatre on Saturdays and Sundays, have a big cast of mainly children.
Craig Sailaway plays the Squire and his son Harvey plays one of the Squire’s funny sidekicks, Bash, and is absolutely hilarious.
Craig’s two daughters, Millie and Isabella, also play roles in the chorus.
Millie is one of the adorable student fairies, and Isabella plays one of the make-up assistants, Estee, who manages to make Mother Goose look, well, not so young as she was hoping.
Two lovely sisters, Maria and Lucia Bella Sykes, also play in the chorus and are seasoned performers after being in the last couple of pantomimes.
Another set of sisters are Hazel and Yvette Auglys, who are newcomers to the theatre and play several roles plus the chorus.
There are only three adults in the cast, Craig Sailaway, and Jane Rivers who plays Mother Goose.
Jane has been involved with Noosa Arts for over three decades, behind the scenes, and was the president for a couple of those years.
Tom Middleton plays the character “Demon Night”.
Tom was in last year’s pantomime, as well as a few plays over the past couple of years, and is a favourite with audiences.
The pantomime attracts many kids who enjoy being a part of the show each year, such as Nicholas Tatham who plays Biff, the other sidekick to the Squire, and sweet Laurah-Jade Larkin, who is performing in her sixth pantomime as Jill.
Every year the theatre introduces new stars to the panto line up, and this year it welcomed Ashley O’Donovan who plays Jack, Imogen Hill as Lauder and Emily Talbott as Fairy Day. They are all doing a magnificent job.
Xavier Vass is brilliant as Silly Billy, and he recently performed as one of the young Peter Allen’s in The Boy From Oz in November.
Two other gorgeous munchkins are Charlotte Van Wachem, who’s in the chorus and a couple of other roles, and Mackenzie Dragan who plays Priscilla.
Although Mackenzie has no lines to say, not many could perfect the role of a young goose the way she does.
Not many people realise how much organisation is involved to get a pantomime up and running.
Director Susan Dearnley has been directing Noosa Arts Theatre’s pantomimes for the past 10 years.
The show is put in motion three months ahead with an information night held at the theatre, and then followed by a day or two of casting calls. Once the cast is in place, a rehearsal schedule is put in place.
Naturally the cast works hard but there are many people working behind the scenes, such as music, which is always especially written for the show by Di Thomson.
Robyn Holliday is live on stage with her piano accompanying the cast with all the fun sing-a-long songs.
The theatre is run by volunteers and are lucky to have the great skill sets of the set building team, The Secret Men’s Business helped by Noosa’s Men’s Shed, and of course not forgetting the backstage crew of stage managers and all the friendly front of house and bar staff at the theatre.
The theatre is always looking for more volunteers for all these areas, so if you would like to join the team please call the theatre or go to the website and become a member, so you will get all the information about our shows and upcoming auditions.
Mother Goose has two more weekends to go on 14, 15, 21 and 22 January.
Hurry to secure your tickets either online at noosaartstheatre.org.au or call the box office on (07) 5449 9343 Tuesday to Fridays between 10am and 2pm. Saturday and Sunday has two shows, Saturday at 11am and 2pm and Sunday 1pm and 4pm.
