A MUCKY day in Malvern in mid-September doesn't exactly evoke the spirit of Christmas pantomime with all its glamour, glitz and audience warmth, but they were doing their best.

The three stars of this year's seasonal panto at the Festival Theatre had turned up in all their fine costumery for a Press photo call - and it started to rain.

Oh, no it didn't. Oh, yes it did!

Suddenly plans to take joyous pictures of Marti Webb, Nicholas Smith and Chris Jarvis romping in Priory Park looking for Cinderella's fairy coach went out the window.

Instead the trio huddled beneath an umbrella on the theatre steps and did their best to look happy.

Fairly easy, really, since all are experienced troupers.

"Look this way, please!"

Flash, bang. Oh what a picture. It could have been encore time at the matinee.

Then they all got changed and over some very pleasant smoked salmon thingies and quartered sandwiches with an assortment of fillings, we, the assembled Press, all three of us plus a chap from local radio with a microphone and a much-logoed car, attempted the job of interviewing, while consuming mouthfuls of food at the same time.

Brushing the crumbs from by notebook, I can tell you that Nicholas Smith, he of the domed head and bloodhound expression, is an old hand at panto.

A very old one, considering he did his first in 1957-58, when, as he hastened to point out, he was still a child actor.

Forever cast in the nation's psyche as Mr Rumbold in the evergreen Are You Being Served, Nick's career has covered everything from the Royal Shakespeare Company to television commercials.

In 1962, he appeared in panto with Morecambe and Wise at Bristol, an experience he'll never forget.

"At one point I had the job of feeding Eric for four minutes before Ernie arrived on stage," he said.

"I asked him whether he wanted me to stay in character or crack up as he ad-libbed.

" 'Oh, stay in character,' he said. 'It's much better'.

"And I did. Just. But it was a near thing. He was a very funny man."

Across the room Marti Webb was looking at her watch, anxious not to be late for a date to record a slot for Songs of Praise.

What will she be singing in the panto?

"I don't know yet," she answered. "We'll wait until near rehearsal time and see which songs are popular.

"You've always got to have something the audience can sing along to. Last year it was Reach for the Stars. It went down very well in Bath."

A very class act in her own right, Marti struck me as being a bit too upmarket for the rough and tumble of panto.

"Actually, I love it," she said. "You're never quite sure what's going to happen. A lot depends on the audience."

Sadly, we, the assembled Press, didn't get to meet the other stars of Cinderella, which include the delicious Sophia Thierens, whose absence completely blighted the day of Aaron Manning, our photographer, and the Sensational Shetland Ponies, for whom I had saved a smoked salmon thingie.

n Cinderella plays Malvern Festival Theatre from Wednesday, December 12 until Saturday, January 5. Tickets £8 to £16. Box office 01684 892277.