„A word from the writer, they said. As if they hadn’t got enough of those already, at least the actors, who had to internalise them and make them sound as though they were theirs and not someone else’s.

So what can one say? Perhaps this: the first version of this panto was written at a particularly difficult time. The preceding panto, Cinderella, my first, written three years earlier and in a flurry of unadulterated enthusiasm, had been received gratifyingly well, so the pressure to write that second one — hopefully to be received equally favourably — was more than a bit daunting. And then the world went mad: September 11th, the Swissair disaster, the man who ran amuck in the parliament of Zug killing fourteen people, it was a tough time to write, trying to be funny. Now, ten years later, all this is history, and yet, the inevitable digs at present-day ills, dubious politics and financial shenanigans, apart from a few cosmetic changes did not really have to be updated for this new version, which is a sobering thought. The text with some modifications and some new songs still seems to hold up.

And it is once again brought to life by a troupe that could not be more enthusiastic and inspiring, and enriched by the beautiful tunes that Simon Reber has written. It is the most gratifying thing that could happen to me.

A word from the writer, they said. That word, it could only be THANKS!“

Franz Andres Morrissey