Act Reviews 2024 / 2025 Season

The BLOW QUEEN (The Adult Pantomime) Written by Steven Oliver-Grant Directed by Daniel Oliver-Grant Sparks Dramatic Society You cannot beat sitting back on a lazy Saturday afternoon with a cup of coffee in one hand and thumbing through an entertaining magazine in the other. The programme for Sparks latest adult pantomime was an excellent adult read. Entitled “Take a Snake” it contained all the usual features as other popular top shelf mags, enlightening stories of those offering personal services, colourful adverts, the obligatory defrocking of a poor teacher, information on the deviants that entertain, a scratch off game to exercise your wrist and games such as “Spot the Logo” – the ACT logo was evident in every page. The time it took to finish off this magazine was nearly as much time as the pantomime took. I poured over the sage advice of agony aunt, Fonda Dix’s problem page, on how to eradicate those stubborn stains! This programme designed by Dave Ayre was a hoot in itself, I am sure that all the contributors had a ball (or two) when putting it together and it was well worth the time to read. This was an “ADULT” pantomime and not for the woke: we were told this in very direct terms from the projected film of Fonda Dix prior to the commencement of the show. Steven Oliver-Grant was in charge of the writing this year; this is the third adult script he has developed for the group to perform. Each year I see that his style and content becomes more refined. There are the characters that we have in more family orientated pantomimes but with more outrageous names. These characters use the occasional expletives when pressing home their point. There is reference of a sexual nature, and the inclusion of flirting with audience members, and innuendo. I personally enjoy the use of innuendo, as means to create laughter, where lines are delivered innocently and tongue in cheek, a

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