Jack and the Beanstalk – Birmingham Hippodrome

Writers: Harry Michaels & Matt Slack

Director: Michael Harrison

It’s been a year of highlights at the Birmingham Hippodrome and as always they’re seeing the year out with a bang with their usual big-budget pantomime. This year it’s Jack and the Beanstalk and it’s as big and spectacular as ever, with a stunning set design from Mark Walters to add to the hugely talented cast and effects.

There’s a saying about not changing a winning formula, and the Hippodrome team has adopted that with a vengeance, bringing back Matt Slack for his tenth successive year, this time as Jack’s brother Jake Trot. Slack is undoubtedly incredibly good at what he does, and Birmingham audiences love him. You know exactly what you’re going to get when he walks onto the stage with his routines varying little from one year to the next (“same jokes, different costume,” he says at one point) and it seems the Hippodrome crowd can’t get enough of him. He is totally at ease with everything he does, from comedy impressions to audience interaction, including going off script when the moment arises to add to the humour. His work with the children who are brought onto the stage before the finale is always a treat, as you never know how they’ll react, and on press night they found a young boy who could finally put him in his place – a budding comedian if ever there was one.

Not that Slack has it all his own way in the popularity stakes, with Birmingham’s own Alison Hammond giving him more than a run for his money with possibly the biggest cheer of the night when she walks on as the Spirit of the Beans. Hammond also seems totally at ease on the Hippodrome stage (it’s hard to believe this is her Hippodrome panto debut) and brings her own warm personality to add to the proceedings. With some dance moves that remind us of her time on Strictly Come Dancing she does a very funny comedy section with Slack, working together as though they were made for each other.

Also back for another year is panto Dame extraordinaire Andrew Ryan as Dame Trot. He’s clearly learnt a lot in his 33 years of playing the dame and has a good voice to show off alongside his comedy. We have the usual delightful deadpan delivery from Doreen Tipton as Doreen Trot the cow – ideal casting for a character who claims she has Lazy Cow Syndrome – with some delightful moments as she goes, including a hilarious version of I Dreamed a Dream. Then there’s TV favourite Samantha Womack as Mrs Blunderbore the giant’s wife giving us her refreshing take on the baddie role – it’s a shame that much of her dialogue is inaudible over the music.

When you have a personality as popular as Matt Slack it’s clearly very tempting to give him more and more to do, and it does feel as though the pantomime is becoming more like the Matt Slack show though it seems to be what the audiences want. When Slack dominates so much of the evening it’s inevitable that some of the others get little to do – we could do with seeing more of the other local favourite on stage Alexanda O’Reilly (Jack), and Billie-Kay is massively underused as Princess Jill.

The plot bears little resemblance to the traditional Jack and the Beanstalk tale – in fact, during act one you might be forgiven for thinking you’d wandered into a mixture of Into the Woods and Joseph and the Amazing Technicolour Dreamcoat – and it’s something the script seizes on and acknowledges with glee. “We’re here for Jake’s hilarious jokes, not some half-baked panto plot” it says at one point, and it’s right – that is what the audience members are largely there for. Still, there’s a spectacular set and costumes, a stage-filling giant and an unmissable beanstalk, and a hugely popular cast which brings laughs by the bucketload. What more can you ask for?

Runs until 28 January 2024