Dick Whittington

The Swan Theatre, Worcester

Until Sunday, January 3

Box Office: 01905 611427

Website: theswantheatre.co.uk

DICK Whittington has the potential to have parents squirming in their seats with those inevitable saucy innuendos involving our protagonist's first name.

But luckily all the naughty jokes sailed straight over little ones heads and the only squirming going on during Worcester Repertory Company's pantomime was caused by laughter, dancing and a couple of water pistols.

More on that later.

Dick Whittington is the well known tale of a boy and his cat who go to find fortune in London where he believes the "streets are paved with gold".

Sadly, it is rats and not gold paving the streets as our wet behind the ears hero, played by James Keningdale, finds out as they do the bidding of Queen Rat (Liz Grand).

Liz is no stranger to the "baddie" role and she is perfectly apt at eliciting all the boos and hisses from the audience and commands the stage with her army of rats.

At the other end of the scale is Dick's sweetheart Alice Fitzwarren (Eva Crawford) whose superb vocals soared over the songs while Rob Leetham brought the fun as her father and later as the Captain Jack Sparrow-esque swaggering Pirate King.

A good pantomime hinges on its Dame and The Swan's is in the safe, if glitter stained, hands of director Ben Humphrey who steps into the sparkly shoes of Dame Ginny.

She's a hoot, diving though the audience to sit herself upon men's laps and planting kisses on their faces as well as dealing adeptly with heckles and wild tangents.

Also providing the slapstick were the duo Captain Cockles and Mate Muscle (Jonny Muir and Jonathan Darby) the latter, having turned 50 that day, given a spirited rendition of Happy Birthday by the cast, audience and what seemed like 100 family members.

It was a lovely moment.

Favourite character seemed to be Tommy the Cat (Jessie Loudthop) though there were plenty of younger members of the audience also spellbound by Fairy Bow Bells (Sophie-Jo Lusted).

The whole thing moves at a lightning quick pace thanks to Chris Jaeger's writing and producing.

Stand out moments included a bit of UV magic, a singalong to What Shall We Do With the Drunken Sailor, the opening number, Uptown Funk, which had us all bopping along and, yes, those water pistols.

The great thing about pantomime is, it is a real leveller.

Looking around the audience, there were people of all ages and from all walks of life who were all merrily singing and joining in and enjoying the experience.

The streets of London may not have been paved with gold but The Swan's panto is solid gold. Make sure you catch it.