Cinderella at The Anvil, Basingstoke Review
Disclosure: We were invited to see this show for the purpose of this post however all opinions are my own.
Last night we were invited to see Cinderella at The Anvil in Basingstoke. It was their opening night and we couldn’t wait to see the show. The Anvil is a fantastic theatre, in the heart of Basingstoke town centre, and they always put on a great show.
Cinderella at The Anvil
The Cinderella pantomime at The Anvil is very much true to the original fairy tale. It’s the ultimate rags to riches story where poor Cinderella works hard day and night while her ugly sisters do nothing.
But she meets her Fairy Godmother and her life starts to change for the better! It’s a show that transports you from Hardup Hall to the Prince’s Castle, from a hunt in the forest and to a wonderful ball – not to mention the grand finale of a wedding at the end!
The Cinderella Cast
Debbie McGee plays the Fairy Godmother in her Anvil debut and it’s lovely to see such a familiar face on the stage. Rachel Grundy is fantastic as Cinderella. She’s believable and showed such emotion, with a beautiful voice too!
Cinderella’s chemistry with Prince Charming is lovely, they are the perfect pairing. Joseph Hewlett is a wonderful Prince Charming, with all the mannerisms and ego that we’ve come to expect from such a character.
Chris Pizzey plays Buttons effortlessly. Chris has become a familiar face to us, after seeing him in a few shows over the years, and his performances are always flawless. This year is no different.
He is a fantastic Buttons, and we loved seeing his friendship with Cinderella blossom. With endless jokes and a fantastic rapport with the audience, Chris is an absolute delight to see on stage.
Nic Gibney and Duncan Burt make a great double act as the Ugly Sisters. Their costumes are phenomenal and they had everyone laughing along with them throughout. As much as we all love to hate the Ugly Sisters, we absolutely loved this pair – they are more funny and entertaining than the really mean Ugly Sisters we are used to, and it makes a refreshing change.
As well as the ensemble, there are also children from North Hampshire Academy of Dance and Basingstoke Academy of Dance who are a delight to see on stage. They dance their socks off and keep up with the choreography like absolute pros. The dancing is great across the board but a special mention for the children – they blew us away!
What did we think of the Cinderella pantomime?
We really enjoyed Cinderella this year. There are so many jokes and we found ourselves laughing constantly. The children loved the jokes around ‘balls’ and farting and Dave and I cringed along to the ruder jokes now that the children understand more of them!
Dave said he thought that the pantomime was ruder this year but, I didn’t agree. I felt it’s just as risqué as ever, pushing the boundaries of polite entertainment! The only difference is now our children are older, and laugh along at the jokes, we realise how rude they actually are! Most of the jokes would go straight over young children’s heads but that all changes when they start secondary school!
One of the best parts for me was the music. It was fantastic! From Uptown Girl to Sky Full of Stars, Born This Way and a pretty amazing rendition of Sweet Caroline with full audience participation near the end of the show and so many other familiar songs too. The music is great and the band do such a good job too.
The whole show is such fun, the stage looks fantastic for every scene, the costumes are perfect and the surprise of real life Shetland ponies just adds to the magic. We really enjoyed Cinderella and I’m sure you would love it too.
Cinderella is on at The Anvil until 2nd January 2023.
