Odyssey: A Heroic Pantomime – Jermyn Street Theatre

Emily Cairns, Meriel Cunningham and Tamoy Phipps in Odyssey: A Heroic Pantomime at the Jermyn Street Theatre, London. Picture: Alex Brenner

Odyssey: A Heroic Pantomime continues at the Jermyn Street Theatre, London until 31 December 2023.

Star rating: four stars ★ ★ ★ ★ ✩

Take five talented women, the best-known epic in European literature and two surreally inspired writers and it makes for a pretty good evening’s seasonal theatre although it’s a mystery to me why performers need radio mics in a space the size of Jermyn Street Theatre.

Odysseus has disappeared on his way home from Troy and the gods on Olympus want to help. So far, so Homer. Then we dance off into pantoland with lots (and lots) of Hermes delivery jokes, a gloriously inebriated Dionysus and a seafarer-type Poseidon.

It’s a gently feminist take on the Odyssey so Penelope (Emily Cairns, also good as a Barbie-style gor-blimey Aphrodite) proactively goes off to look for him, accompanied by her husband’s horse Trojan, who has an oft-mentioned gut problem.

Directed by co-writer John Savourin, this is a pantomime for grown-ups. It isn’t particularly smutty but the sometimes esoteric Greek jokes and puns flow thick and fast. “There’s a riot in the square on the hypotenuse” and it’s a glorious moment when composer/accompanist/MD David Eaton (also co-writer) and percussionist Dave Jennings, who punctuates every joke on cymbal in the traditional way, don green hats and do a quick turn as Aristophanes’ frogs.

It’s whacky, crazy, witty and intelligent. We get a blinded (with a steak in the eye – get it?) Polyphemus who turns out to be a good guy (woman) who speaks in a West Country accent and has the hots for Trojan. Circe becomes a pantomime villain(ess) complete with malevolent cackling over the rest of the pig-masked cast.

Most of the usual panto features are in. There’s audience participation, shouting back, a rather endearing Cilla Black imitation and a silly competition for two willing chaps from the back row.

Because, moreover, this is Charles Court Opera, there is some fine singing tucked into all this daftness. And every single word is clear.

All five cast members are strong but Meriel Cunningham is the one who really stands out. Her main role is Trojan the horse – the clue to what eventually happens to provide a happy ending is in the name, by the way.

Cunningham has an unusual, resonantly deep singing voice – at times reminiscent of an old-fashioned contralto – and it’s rich like mulled wine, every note delivered impeccably. She is also a very gifted actor who completely inhabits her role with understated equine snorts, knowing coy looks at the audience and delightfully nuanced, very funny, body work. Her sozzled, incomprehensible Dionysus is another masterclass in comedy.

Of course, there’s lots of quick change doubling in this well-paced piece and the accent work is versatile.

An engaging show, it is a pleasing example of how you can take a hackneyed old genre like panto and make it really fresh – and good fun.

Susan Elkin