The Pantomime Dame - ACE123.2

Actors making up and getting into costume. Song over about "the wonderful Pantomime Dame". Victoria Wood describing the strange characters of pantomime, including the Dame. Billy Dainty as Widow Twanky. Credits. Victoria Wood on the Dame’s first appearance. Billy Dainty as Widow Twanky. Wood explains that the Dame connects with the audience both as a mother figure and as a man pretending to be a woman for an audience that sees through the pretence. Another Aladdin performance with Ian Evans. Wood VO explains the long cross-dressing tradition and deduces that the comic Dame character isstill important to the audience. Terry Scott as Dame Trot (Jack and the Beanstalk). Jack Tripp also as Dame Trot. Wood introduces John Morley who believes that the Dame is analogous to characters from seaside postcards. Ian Evans as Widow Twanky. Morley’s VO points out that the Dame arrived in British pantomime when Queen Victoria was on the throne. Early 19th century appearances included that of Joseph Grimaldi. The "red hot poker" sequence from Aladdin (production as 06:46) which derives from Grimaldi’s original. Victorian toy theatre. Photograph of early Dame. Photographs of James Rogers, "the first Widow Twanky" (1861). Photographs of Arthur Roberts, first Dame (Mrs Crusoe) to appear at Drury Lane, 1881. Dan Leno, who first appeared as a Dame in 1888.Wood asks what the essential characteristics of a Dame are.