Episode 137 - Susie McKenna

Episode 137 – Susie McKenna: Reimagining Pantomime for a New Generation

In Episode 137 of the Just Imagine podcast, host Martin Ballard is joined by the acclaimed writer, director and actor Susie McKenna, whose groundbreaking work at the Hackney Empire helped redefine what modern pantomime could be.

From her early days performing with her parents and training in Leicester, to becoming a Principal Boy under the mentorship of the legendary Kenneth Alan Taylor, Susie reflects on the experiences that shaped an extraordinary career spanning theatre, musical theatre and pantomime.

The conversation explores her journey from performer to writer and director, the creation of the iconic Hackney Empire pantomimes, and how she transformed traditional fairy tales into productions that reflected the communities they served while remaining true to the heart of pantomime.

Susie also discusses the importance of storytelling, creating authentic and diverse characters, writing for the actors in the company, and why pantomime should never be afraid to tackle contemporary themes. She shares the inspiration behind some of her most celebrated productions, including Mother Goose, Sleeping Beauty, Puss in Boots and her acclaimed reimagining of Dick Whittington through the story of the Windrush generation.

Packed with warmth, humour and fascinating behind-the-scenes insights, this episode is a celebration of creativity, collaboration and the enduring power of pantomime to entertain, inspire and bring communities together.

Subscribe now and join us for another behind-the-scenes journey into the wonderful world of pantomime.

Transcript

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SPEAKER_00 0:03

Just Imagine, a podcast series by Imagine Theatre.

SPEAKER_03 0:07

Hello again and welcome to episode 137 of Imagine Theatre's Podcast Series. This time we're chatting to an award-winning director, writer, and actor, best known for her legendary pantomimes at the Hackney Empire.

SPEAKER_00 0:19

For more information, go to their website at www.imagineheatre.co.uk.

SPEAKER_03 0:26

Now in the last episode, I was joined by the actor, theatre creative, and educator who's worked across the UK and appeared in countless West End shows. He's the resident dame for Imagine at the Wyvern Theatre in Swindon, David Ashley. If you missed that episode, you can check it out where you get your podcast from. And don't forget to subscribe to the series so that you don't miss out in the future. Now, in this episode, again, I'm delighted to say we're going to catch up with the critically acclaimed award-winning freelance director, writer, and actor who's worked in theatre, television, and film. Again, she's perhaps best known for writing and directing the legendary pantomimes at the Hackney Empire. Susie McKenna, how are you?

SPEAKER_01 1:07

I'm all right. How are you, Martin?

SPEAKER_03 1:09

I'm really good, and I've been looking forward to this because you've got such a rich career, not just in Panto, but across all sorts of genres in film, television, and theatre. But I want to start with where it all began because you're originally from Leicester. So where did it begin for you in terms of getting the bug to perform?

SPEAKER_01 1:29

Well, we moved up to Leicester. I was born in London, and my parents were in variety, and so they travelled around a lot. By the time I was about four, we'd they'd settled in Leicester because Leicester was central. And in those days, you could, you know, you could buy um a good reasonable new property there. My parents were, all my family come from social housing, and my parents got out and bought their first house in Leicester so that they could travel to Manchester and sort of where the gigs were, they were more central. So we we settled in Leicester, and I guess what kicked it off for me, obviously, because my parents were doing it, that at a really young age I was on stage with them. I remember, I don't know if people remember those big old um I mean they played theatres, they played summer seasons, and my dad was in Ensa during the war and stuff, and he was a bit older than my mum, so he played the city varieties and things. But by the time I came along and they were playing those massive working men's clubs, you know those ones that go on for days as you look down, and that's like a really early memory for me. A whole cloud of smoke, and people sitting, drinking, enjoying, and my parents on stage and me on stage with them. That's where it kind of all started. My mum started to teach me to tap, and then when we got to Leicester, my mum found a dancing school, and I know that you're from Leicester, so you know how fantastic the dancing schools there are there, they are extraordinary. And in fact, the two big ones, DuPont and Oliver's, are still going to this very day. Their rivalry actually I think really elevated the standard to which we were all learning. And I learned as well with uh another woman called Marianne Tamsett who was incredible and just had television. So I learned to dance in Leicester, and my early Panto memory is obviously as a as a babe in Panto, I did a couple when I was at Ann Oliver's, but then actually going to see one would have been going to see Des O'Connor and Basil Brush at the De Montford in Leicester. Oh wow, and I can't remember how old I was, but I was pretty young, and we lined up for ages to get their autographs, which I still have to this day. And I mean, I was obsessed with Basilbrush, absolutely obsessed with Basilbrush. And so that was my earliest memory, I think, of of actually going to see a panto.

SPEAKER_03 3:57

Yeah, well, of course, Michael Windsor, who is now Basilbrush, has Leicester Lynx as well, of course, through the Haymarket.

SPEAKER_01 4:03

Yeah, and I actually worked with Michael. Um, he did a pantomime for Kenneth Alan Taylor at Nottingham, what I was in.

SPEAKER_03 4:11

Again, your mum taught you to tap, your dad, I think, helped you with singing and so on. Where did that step to going into the business professionally come from Anne Oliver onwards?

SPEAKER_01 4:21

I got into the arts educational school at 16 and to do their musical theatre course, which was quite young to be doing that course, and that was amazing. But I was at a stage in my life where I needed a bit of time out. You know, I'd been at school, but I'd been training very heavily at dancing dancing school every night, um, all day Saturdays, and I think I was just a bit, I don't know. I just think I I don't know why I made the decision, but I did, and I was said, I said to my dad, I want I want a year out. So I went off and became a blue coat at Pontins, yeah, um, at Pristatin Sands, and I did a whole summer season, and I was supposed to start in the autumn, and I said to my dad, I'm gonna take a bit more time off, and I'm gonna see if I can get a panto. And then I promised my dad I'd go to college the year later, and art said were very understanding, particularly because I was so young, so they were like, Yep, cool, we'll wait a year. So I went off and did my first panto at Colchester Mercury Theatre. Jerry Tabot was choreographing, David Buxton was directing, and it was Puss in Boots starring Angela Bruce, who was one of the main characters in Angels. There was a series called Angels, it was all about nurses, and she was one of the main characters in that. And she played Puss, and I was in the in the ensemble, absolutely inspired by her, and it was a sort of pantomime, it wasn't a big commercial pantomime, obviously, it was a subsidized theatre pantomime at the Mercury, so it was very much story-led, it had original music, I remember, and I just had the best time, and she was such an inspiration and really kind of took me under her wing because I really wanted to play Principal Boy, and so I watched her all the time, and that was the first pantomime I did, and then after that, I still wasn't in the mood for college, so I then went back to Bontins for a while, and then I did another panto at Mercury, and then I got into hair, which was the National Tour of Hair, playing Chrissy, who sings Frank Mills, and I didn't go to college at all, which was not if I you know I would not recommend that now for young people necessarily, but it does show that you can do it with the right sort of chance, the right amount of luck, and I decided not to go. I did my A levels whilst I was working, and I did it that way, really. And I the the tour of Hair went on for quite some months. After Hair, I settled back in London. I was already living in London with my godparents, but I settled back in London and with my boyfriend, and that was that really, and just carried on working.

SPEAKER_03 7:05

Back in the in the day in Leicester, as well as the De Motford Hall, there were several other theatres back in the 60s, particularly Royal Opera House Palace, and so on, and many of those did pantos. But I wondered whether or not your parents ever did panto.

SPEAKER_01 7:17

My dad did. When I got to about sort of seven, eight, something like that. My parents gave up touring and became semi-pro, um, so they just work weekends, and then they just sort of gave it up altogether and joined the amateur world in Leicester. So my mum and my dad did amateur theatre in Leicester, as did I. I was in Sound of Music and lots of shows for Leicester Operatic Society. My dad started directing pantos and being in them, and he did a lot of pantos at the Hinckley Concordia, oh, yeah. The Concordia Theatre there, and then he did the YMCA pantomime uh at Leicester a few times. My ne my mum was never really into panto. She only really got into pantomime really once she's come started coming to see them at Hackney Empire, if I'm honest.

SPEAKER_02 8:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:09

Um, even the Nottingham ones. I mean, she'd come and she loved them, but it wasn't, it's not, it wasn't really her bag, but the Hackney Empire one she adored because she became a bit of a celebrity.

SPEAKER_03 8:19

Okay, well, you mentioned you mentioned Nottingham. I mean, this man you've said on numerous occasions is probably the biggest influence on your career. The legendary Nottingham Playhouse dame, director and writer Kenneth Alan Taylor. Do you remember the first job you did there?

SPEAKER_01 8:35

Actually, it was in Oldham for him. So he at the time he was up in Oldham Coliseum. I was 19, because it was not long after I'd done hair, actually. I auditioned for him. He gave me my first Principal Boy, which was Dick Whittington at Oldham Coliseum with Jeff Longmore playing Dame. Bobby Kingswell was in it. That was fantastic. I mean, I was it was a dream come true for me. I'd always wanted to play Principal Boy, and there I was, and he he was an extraordinary mentor to all of us. He instilled that passion for pantomime that which I carry with me today, and to many of us. Not just a passion for pantomime, it was a passion for theatre and doing it well and being part of a building. It was very much. I I did two pantomimes at Oldham for him, and then I came down. He then got artistic director at Nottingham Playhouse, and he started pantomime at Nottingham Playhouse. Nottingham Playhouse did not have a pantomime when Kenneth got there, and it was in terrible debt as a theatre. Um, it had been doing great work, but it was in in a lot of debt. You can imagine in the 80s being in debt, that was tough for any theatre. Um and so he started a pantomime there, and everybody there were lots of murmurings going, how can they do pantomime in a subsidized theatre like Nottingham, you know, and it was it was quite snobby about it. And of course, he he turned around the theatre's fortunes with not just the pantomime, but with the the seasons he was doing, which were popular. They were they were very much telling the audience at Nottingham that that theatre was for everyone, and a real wide range of um local writing and musicals, and and obviously he started the pantomime there. So I played Principal Boy. The first Principal Boy I did there was gosh, I think it was Jack. I think it was Jack, I can't remember. It was probably Jack, it was probably Jack and the Meanstalk, which was also the last one I did there. I did eight years as Principal Boy there, and then did quite a lot of work during the season. So I did work in that area, so I did Leicester Haymarket, Derby Playhouse, Coventry, up to Sheffield and Manchester. So I I a lot of my work in the first, certainly the first ten years of my career was very much in the Midlands and the North. Um, and Gathers was a huge influence on me. Yeah, he gave me a lot of chances, and but I learnt so much.

SPEAKER_03 11:08

We often talk on the podcast about the importance of pantomime for theatres, you know, keeping them afloat financially, but also for children, inspiring children in their first sort of experience of theatre to at least go back to the theatre throughout their lives, but very often to perform as well. Then the actress Rosalie Craig, I'm sure you're aware of this, said that you were the inspiration for her. She saw you in Panto at the Nottingham Playhouse, and it was because of that that she was inspired to pursue a career in the theatre. I mean, that that's one of the joys of doing this job, isn't it?

SPEAKER_01 11:41

Yeah, it's totally is. I mean, it's it really is actually. And as and and Matt Dempsey, who I've worked with, who's become my associate director and and as an actor, was in many pantomimes at Hackney as well as other things. He also wrote to me when he was nine, um, apparently, and uh, and and thank God I wrote back to him. Um, and then we were doing Witches of Eastwick in the West End, and we actually weren't in the same cast. He was in the first cast, I was in the second, and he left me a message at the stage door going, I'm really gutted that I'm not staying in the show because basically I used to watch you at Nottingham Playhouse. So we ended up having tea together, and I fell in love with him, I adored him and loved him on stage, and and then we started working together. So, yeah, it's a it is that is what it's all about, and and I think as well with with the pantomime, Kenneth was adamant that we would never lose sight, that the children came first, that the storytelling, that their enjoyment was was absolutely paramount, and and that the adults came along for the ride. And that's kind of how Kenneth writes, and his adult kind of humour comes out of the ad libbing that he used to do. I mean, it was an amazing baptism of fire being on stage with Kenneth, he never knew what was going to come out. Absolutely never knew what was gonna come out, and sometimes towards the end when we were working together and we were on stage together, because obviously he still played Dane many times when I was playing Principal Boy, there would be times when the the front cloths particularly were like there were nothing that was on the page, there was it was just mostly Kenneth having uh having a lot of laughs at my expense. Uh but you know you you learn, you that's how you learn, it's how you learn to to sort of like, and then I'd kind of get the courage to ad lib back, knowing that if it didn't land, I would I would get his wrath when we came off stage. Yeah, it was an amazing time, and and yeah, I owe a lot to Kenneth. And as do a lot of people in our industry. I mean, we were all sort of based at Nottingham Playhouse, and people now who run theatres high up in backstage. Um, Alan Finch, for example, who is now head of Cameron Macintosh organisation. There's Simon Bourne, who's um head of production at the Barbican, Robert Jones, the award-winning designer, Rory Murgison. So many of us were very young, and he he took chances on us, you know. I I'm not quite sure how much of that happens now. I hope it still does. You know, it is the way that you got into theatre, you know, particularly when you didn't go through, you know, as a working-class young person, I you know, actually it would have been a huge financial strain on my parents if I'd have gone to college, and and in fact, you know, probably it was great that I didn't, so it didn't put that pressure on them. Yeah, so many of us who are in the industry now owe owe a lot to Kenneth, and often we we often talk about that.

SPEAKER_03 14:36

So many jobs that you did uh as an actor, West End jobs, Katz and Chicago, Ragtime, Witches of Eastwick, and all sorts of other stuff. But in the 90s, you started to direct as well, and um it was, I think the first one was with Barry Cryer, wasn't it, in terms of Panto?

SPEAKER_01 14:54

It was, you've done your research, yeah, absolutely. Yeah, it was. It was with Barry Cryer and Michelle Collins, and there was a producer called Christopher Lillycrapp who had was starting to sort of build his rep his sort of portfolio of pantomimes. Him and his wife had a company called Muffin Productions, and I got a phone call out of the blue. I'd been doing a bit of West End work and I was living in Hackney, and I'd just done a Paul Elliott one actually the year before. I did a big Paul Elliott commercial pantomime, which was a it was fun, but it wasn't it for me, it wasn't I didn't enjoy it so much. It was okay. I had it, I learned a lot because Windsor Davis was in that and June Brown, and I had a great time, but and I was kind of sort of I was at work and and then suddenly uh the phone goes and Christopher goes, Um, I used to see you at Nottingham Playhouse, and I bought a set of the last pantomime that you did there, Jack in the Beanstalk. And I wondered whether you'd direct and be in it. And I I just remember hearing myself say yes without really thinking about it and putting the phone down and going, Oh my god, what have I done? Because quite frankly, I didn't have any sort of burning desire to do that, but it was just someone had asked me, and I was like, Well, why not? And it was in Hackney and the Hackney Empire, for goodness sake, it was just like, oh my god, Hackney Empire. I walked in that theatre and just fell in love with that theatre. She just epitomized everything about theatre that I loved and that you dream about, I suppose.

SPEAKER_03 16:29

That that's a big leap of faith, though, isn't it? You know, to take on your first directing role, but actually to be in it as well. How how much pressure was that?

SPEAKER_01 16:38

It was a lot. I mean, and I kept saying to Christopher, why? And I was like, I it was like, oh my god, really? I mean, I played the giant's wife, so I didn't play Principal Boy, I wasn't gonna do that, and they obviously and Michelle and Barry were already on board, actually. So I played the giant's wife, so I I I was only in the second act, which was really good, and I had basically had a big tap number, big number, and I didn't have a lot to do. But I I guess I'd seen Kenneth do it so much that I knew it was possible, but obviously, you don't know, do you? And and you I I had the best support. My company stage manager, Vanessa Sutherland, who remained my company stage management manager up until I left Hackney in 2020. She was just she had my back, you know. You need someone like that when you don't know exactly whether you know what you're doing or not. And I remember being really honest with her and going, I've never directed anything before. Okay, so you just bear with me. I know pantomime, I know I know pantomime, but I just you know, or I thought I knew pantomime. You know, I just you never stop learning, do you? I mean, let's face it, and I think the minute you think you do, then you're in trouble. And even to this day, I'm there's still things that will catch me out, or things that I've learned and go, yeah, why have I never not always done it this way? She had my back, as did the stage management, the rest of the stage management, and and Barry, of course, and Michelle, but Barry particularly was was well a such a lovely, lovely man and talented and would keep us in stitches. I mean, trying to get any work out of him was quite hard, you know, because the stories and the raconteur and the the you know, he was he he held court and gave fantastic stories, but he was also really supportive of the fact that I was a first-time director. Yeah, and I went from there, and you learn as again there I was learning on the job again.

SPEAKER_03 18:30

So, when did when did the writing start?

SPEAKER_01 18:32

I actually wrote the second one, but I didn't put my name on it because I was too scared. So I did the first one Christopher wrote, and then the second one I did at Hackney, which was the year later, we did Cinderella, and at the time at the time in it I was in the kind of another life, I was producing documentaries for television and making tennis videos for the Lawn Tennis Association, like you do. And uh so I had a company, I had a company set up, so I did so I pitched to the Empire that I would produce the next panto because Chris didn't want to. So there I was producing it, writing it, and directing it. I saved a wage by being in it, so that I played Dandini, and I wrote it, and I was so nervous about that I did not put my name on it, which was probably a good thing, actually. I had uh the wonderful Tony Whittle was actually an ugly, as was Regina Fong. Many drag people, people who know drag and the black hat would remember Regina Reg, uh, who's studying no longer with us. But Regina Fong was fabulous, and um yeah, we did we did Cinderella, which seemed to go alright. It wasn't it was tough in those days. Hackney Empire was you know was before the refurb, the only sort of air conditioning were the broken windows and you stuck to the carpet, and it was tough. But the staff there were incredible and loved the fact that we were doing pantomime, but I hadn't quite found my groove, and then I stopped. Uh then I I got into cats and so everything else stopped. I was in cats for for three years nearly. I'd always pitched to Hackney Empire that if they did an in-house pantomime, if they could take ownership of their pantomime, that actually knowing how I'd seen the fortunes of Nottingham Playhouse turn around with having an in-house pantomime, that I I I get, you know, they didn't have any funding in those days, Hackney was living literally hand to mouth on stand-up um and music gigs. And the pantomimes weren't really making money, and so I I was like, let's, you know, how about doing an in-house? And at the time they weren't really interested, and then I went off and did Katz. And literally the the week after I I I left Katz, I got a phone call from Simon Thomsett, who'd taken over a CEO there, who at the time when I was there before was only was a general manager, and he said, You remember that idea you had about doing an in-house pantomime uh uh hackney? Would you still be up for it? And I was like, Hell yeah. And he's like, Okay, right, let's do it. So the first one we did, which was I suppose the Hackney Empire Panto as people know it now, which was a self-produced in-house show with uh starred Clive Rowe and uh as Dame, and I just told them that the the the the sort of the the ideas I had was that it we want I wanted a really fantastically diverse cast, it needed to reflect the area, it needed to be a Hackney Panto for the people of Hackney, and then hopefully the rest of London would follow. And we started small, we had no money. I used to drive, I thank God for Nottingham Playhouse, because I used to go up to Nottingham Playhouse and take bits of their set from the year before and their props and the Kenneth Moore Theatre, the wonderful Nigel Ellicott. He helped me with the costumes and I on you know, I had so much support. In fact, I bumped into Michael Rose the other day at Danville Hall. Because sadly, well, fabulously, my mum is there now. I went to visit and I saw Michael Rose and and I said, and he went, Oh, hi, how are you? I said, I'm fine. I said, I must say to you, I've not said it to you, but if it wasn't for you, I wouldn't be doing the pantomimes. You, you, you, you know, so many people gave me a s a start at Hackney by either giving me things or giving me stuff at a really low rental or whatever to try and just get it going, you know. And without that support from the rest of the pantomime community, particularly, I would never have been able to get it done. You know, and that continued through, and then you know, hopefully I was able to pay it forward once we became more established later.

SPEAKER_03 22:42

Yeah, we often talk on the podcast about the the importance of any panto being unique for its audience in that it you know reflects the area. Nothing epitomizes that more than the hackney pantos that you wrote, uh directed, uh, produced and and was were starring in. And you took Panto into different directions, you know, uncharted territory really, which actually made it so much more relevant to a contemporary audience in many ways, and particularly the audience around Hackney.

SPEAKER_01 23:13

Yeah, I'm very proud of that, and it was scary because I had to have a lot of trust from people because you know it it it it was particularly as it became as it as we became sort of suddenly we were on the map. So we we did three pantomimes and it was building, it was just about washing its face, just about you know, it wasn't losing a lot of money, but it wasn't making a lot of money, and then of course we raised the money to refurb the the theatre. Um, our opening night of Cinderella, which is where the first pantomime Sharon did for me, Sharon D. Clarke, who's my wife, she came and did uh Fairy Godmother and I was Dandini, and we fell in love doing that show, and that was in front of Prince Charles. Uh we did a f a gala night in front of Prince Charles and all these like the Rothschilds and Jerry Hall and Mick Jagger and all sorts of people. It was bonkers because Hackney Empire was really on its uppers at that point. There we were with the with the with the royal trumpeters in the because you had to have trumpeters in those days to get when when when the when he entered, and um I think there was a bigger show going front of house than there was on on stage. That was when we got the first check for a quarter of a million pounds from uh Alan Sugar to start the refurb. And so we raised money. We the theatre went dark, we'd used to do little kid shows in the bullion roamed theatre, and we reopened the theatre in 2003 with the pantomime at the end of that year, 2003-4, with Aladdin. You know, we were lucky to get the time out, and maybe I don't think we even got the evening standard to cover it. The local paper would cover it, the Hackney Gazette. But you know, we were very much on the down low doing our thing, and I was able then to be able to sort of over three, four years, I was able to sort of push what I was doing writing-wise a little bit more, and and also feeding off of the actors that I was working with, you know, writing for people like Clive Rowe, writing for people like Sharon, Tamika Empson, Kat B, those artists, particularly and Tony, Tony Whittle, or you know, you you you write for the talent. I started realising I was writing for them and playing to their strengths. So in 2004, we we did our first pantomime in the new theatre and we upped our game budget-wise, publicity-wise, everything really, and that was when we were doing Aladdin, and Aladdin was done being done at the old Vic, starring the wonderful Sir Ian McKellen. And of course, you know, at those days they wanted you to have like names in them and things in your pantos. And I was like, you can't get a bigger name than Ian McKellen. How you know that why would why would we compete? Just let me do my show. Just let me do my show. Let that let keep Clive as the as the focus. Let's just tell our stories, which of course is is the is the approach that a lot of subsidized theatres do. They don't have big names in them, and we couldn't afford big names anyway. So it was the beginning of that. Do you know what I mean? That because and so we just I just cast the show as I wanted to cast it. Of course, all the big broadsheets were had never didn't even know where Hackney was, you know. They they needed a passport to get there. Yeah, most of the people that write in they didn't they didn't know where the East London was. Uh, and of course, but there were two Aladdins in London. So I they decided I I think it was almost like, you know, well, you know, so Ian McCann's gonna they do they're doing Aladdin at at the old Vic. Let's have something to compare it to, and thinking that we would be rubbish. And I I think they I think I really do believe that. And they came, you know, people like Charles Spencer came. I mean, Nicholas de Jong came. I mean it was ridiculous, and of course that was it really. They discovered us and Clive as Dame and just the the different nature of the shows that we were doing, and we came we we critically were very was very favourable, and that was the beginning of it establishing it as a as the as a London panto and and and a sort of destination, and I again still learning on the job, changing all the time, pushing it, pushing it, pushing it, and then over the next what 20, 22 years, 20 odd years, yeah. I like to be able to, you know, push the boundaries and really think about what the storytelling says to the audience. You know, these a lot of the the stories that we have in pantomime, you know, they were they're old fables, they're old fairy tales that were often told verbally or written down to teach morality, to teach young people, uh children, the the good and evil and all of that, you know, they were there. And and some of them are pretty suspect, you know, especially the source material, and then often it's been Disney fied or or indeed pantomime fied, you know, in terms of how the stories are told. And for me, it was like, well, I here I am, I've got a I've got an incredibly diverse audience. We're going into the 21st century, we're going into a time when things are very different for young people, and indeed, you know, in Hackney, you know, young people were being killed on the streets. The knife crime was very bad during that time. You know, you you have to start thinking about how you're telling these stories and why. And so I was able to push the stories and just think about how they relate to young people today, and be able to create sub-characters that perhaps they could identify with. So the writing became, I suppose, actually more important than anything for me then, and I just adored sort of pushing those boundaries and ending up sort of telling the, for example, telling the Dick Whittington story through the eyes of a young man coming arriving on the Windrush, or talking about sleeping beauty, having her be a warrior princess who takes care of her own destiny. And Mother Goose, I just adored Mother Goose, I adore Mother Goose, and it was a wonderful vehicle for Clive, of course. And so being able to write great characters within that. Mother Goose was the one where I I I feel like the cast were at its ultimate, like everybody in that cast was was were flying high and were amazing, and they'd all been working together quite some time. It was one of the few times towards the end of the thing that I towards the end of my my reign, I was actually in it, and so we had the best time doing that. And in fact, we did exactly the same show twice. We did it, we we did um in 20 2008, and then I think 14. Pushing and pushing and pushing the stories and being able to really have fun culturally as well. I think being part of a black family. As I say, I met Sharon in 2000 and became part of her family. And when you when you're living it, you know, when you're when you're with when you're with that that family and it's a very different culture to what you've grown up with, and that but then you realise what the similarities are as Londoners, and then you sit and you hear the stories from the old people and the older, the old the aunties and the uncles and then and then the young. And I think you start and working with actors like like Sharon Clive Kat B, Darren Hart, Tamika Empson, like glorious to write for, and also incredible ad liver. So, you know, my work was made easy by their talents, really, and it was just glorious working with them and getting to write stuff the way you could show off exactly what they could do.

SPEAKER_03 30:49

Now it's interesting what you were saying about Aladdin, Susie, because I think in many ways it might actually harken back to your days at Nottingham Playhouse in some ways, because you talked about writing at Hackney for the actors that you knew you were working with, which also goes back to what the old-fashioned rep pantos used to do, maybe at the Nottingham Playhouse, but also you talked about competing with Ian McKellen's Aladdin as well. And of course, in Nottingham, that's exactly what you were doing with the Theatre Royal, who had a more commercial, um, you know, celebrity-driven panto, and yet the playhouse was always successful.

SPEAKER_01 31:25

It was actually what why I had the courage to say it to Hackney in the first place, I think, and suggest such a thing to Hackney Empire, because I saw it with my own eyes. Um, and uh in the days when when we first got there, I mean I remember going to see Barbara Windsor in Aladdin at at uh at Nottingham Theatre World, amazing, fantastic. It was one of the longest-running pantomimes in those days. I mean, it would go through to the end of February easily. Very quickly over the years that we were doing them with Kenneth at the Nottingham Playhouse, that that run reduced. I mean, I'm not saying because of the Playhouse Panto, but I think that was a lot to do with financial pressures and uh but it was obviously about demand as well, and suddenly their run was cut shorter and shorter and shorter, and uh Nottingham Playhouse is still running quite a long time, even to this day, in comparison to some of the others. So yeah, yeah, uh it was interesting how being able to actually physically talk to that audience and you know, having that continuity of the same dame every year in Kenneth, who was a fantastic dame, you know. I think they like to come back and see the same people. You know, I used to go I used to go into places like some of the Debenhams, I remember Debonhams in Nottingham and that, and they go, Oh, it's our Susie. Oh, I uh how you doing? You know, it it it it it there was a sense of ownership, and I think that's what I wanted to do at Hackney was give that audience a sense of ownership of the show and to see people that they might see every year, but then it also introduce new people, like for instance David Ashley, who you recently interviewed, yeah, came and did Uglies, but also people from the West End. I persuaded people like Joanna Riding and Josephina Gabrielle, for example, neither of them had ever done Panto, but they used to come and see ours because obviously some lot of them had mates in them and staff, and and uh Joe had kids by this time, and you know, I remember Joe going, Well, why have you never asked me? And I'm like, Well, I don't know, no, I don't know. I never really thought whether you wanted to do it or not. She's like, Hell yeah, I'll come and do it, I'll come and play. And and it was fascinating seeing someone like Joe Riding who hadn't done Panto before and trying to trust it, but not quite sure. And and and is this oh god, breaking this forth we're having this conversation with the audience. What is this? And of course, you do it a little bit in a musical theatre, but nothing in in comparison to to to to Panto, and and that's why I love it the glorious sort of conversation that you have with the audience, and they become the last member of the cast. And I just saw this wonderfully talented performer get on that stage and realize the power. Do you know what I mean? Recognize the power of that and fly with it and just run with it and be amazing at it. And I think, and the same with Josephina, and I think it's really it's fascinating when you see and and and but also see the fear in their eyes, you know, that that that that it's actually pretty terrifying if you've never done it, it's terrifying no matter how experienced you are. So, yeah, yeah. I I I love I love seeing that. I love seeing an artist suddenly go, Wow, this is something else, you know, this is like nothing else I've ever done before, and love it, you know. And Joe came back the next year, she loved it so. And I was very fortunate that those people trusted enough to come and play when Sharon was free. Have her come, and when she wasn't free, she was always a voice in the shows as well. I made her career, she's been a mouse, a cat, uh, a camel.

SPEAKER_03 35:06

You know, as you say, everybody remembers the camel, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 35:09

Yeah, everybody remembers the camel, Carmen and the camel.

SPEAKER_03 35:12

So, I mean, I think the other thing is you've done so many other incredible things, you know, while at Hackney, but also uh at other theatres as well. West End Theatres, Olivier nominated, Blues in the Night as an example. Panto's been a constant thread throughout your career though, hasn't it? But I just wonder if there's any one Panto title that you might pick out as as your favourite or as a standout for you.

SPEAKER_01 35:39

I think for me, Mother Goose, which I know isn't done very often. And Mother Goose for me is my favourite story to tell, if that makes sense. I think you have to have a fabulous dame because it's it's geared around, it's the only one that where the dame is the centre of the actual story rather than being the mother or the cook or the or the you know the servant or whatever. And I love it because it's it's still well, I think they all do, but I think this one particularly has so much to say about finding the beauty from within and and um challenging so much of what we see on the children young people see on social media and about how you're supposed to look and how you're supposed to be and who you're who you are and and and what makes you popular, and and how's you know, a woman's desire to be beautiful actually makes her go to a very dark place. Realises that beauty is not you know, when when your soul is gone, when you've sold your soul for for beauty, actually it leaves you in a very dark and and and sad and lonely place. And I think it's got such a beautiful moral to it, um, and it's just a lovely story to tell. So it that is actually my favourite, and and was often uh I think we did it three times at Hackney, I can't remember. Yeah, I think it was three times, but the last certainly the last two times we did it, as I say, I did it with exactly the same cast both times, and it was just glorious. So we I had I had the best time doing those shows.

SPEAKER_03 37:14

Yeah, I can't understand like you why it's not done more often because it seems to be with an obsession with self-image and Instagram posting and all the sort of things that we see today in television series about medical procedures to make yourself more beautiful and so on, it has more relevance than ever, doesn't it?

SPEAKER_01 37:30

Totally, utterly. Of all of the stories, it has more more relevance. And I think that I think that's why I I'm I'm sad when it's not done enough. And it's and it's hard to persuade theatres to do it, you know. That there I think theatres are nervous of it because it's quite probably not as well known as as the others. I mean, even at Hackney, I did a five I did a five-year cycle for for many years. I mean, almost three, three cycles, I think it was, um, of five years of doing the same stories. And I ended up pleading with them, going, please let me introduce another title because I can't, it's doing my head in, just trying to revisit those those stories and reinvent them because we were held on such a high bar, you know. We the critics were ready to have a go.

SPEAKER_02 38:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 38:17

Uh, because we were on a pedestal, which was a a sort of a in one hand wonderful, in another hand, quite stressful for me. And and so uh, you know, I was begging with them to ignore titles, and they were so nervous about it, um, because by that time the theatre was relying heavily on on the revenue from the show, and they were nervous, you know. And I was like, for goodness sake, the the audience will trust us. We're we're we're sort of, I don't know, what was it 12-15 years down the line by that time? And so I did introduce two more titles, Puss in Boots being one, and I love that one too, because it's all about lies, it's all about telling lies, even the heroes tell lies, and so I wrote a a a particular version where we had doubles of every character virtually. We had sort of two dame-like characters, two two female baddies. We had you, it was it was one of the more ambitious ones that I did at Hackney, and and and it was all about lies. God, if that's not relevant now, I don't know what this is. Yeah, and I wrote it at a time when I when I was particularly it was beginning to sort of be very obvious in the media and on social media how people are being duped by untruths, and you know, like the whole Goebbels playbook, isn't it? You know, if you sell a lie, if you do a lie big enough, the lie is big and you say it often enough, people believe it. Yeah, and so I I I felt that with Puss. And then the same with Sleeping Beauty was the next title I added, and that was really all about female empowerment. But also with Sleeping Beauty, I wanted the idea of it, it was just after Brexit, and I was so angered by Brexit. Was the first time I really I think really embedded my politics within the story, if you like. And I wore my politics, I'd always worn my slightly left centre left leading thing within that with gags, but I'd never written it into a narrative, but I did on that occasion. I was so incensed by it, and so I and also Trump was at his rise and building his wall, and and so it was obvious for me that that something like Sleeping Beauty was about two kingdoms and and the whole idea of the other being vilified. Um, so within that it was about female empowerment, but also about the idea of how futile war is and how futile it is to listen to people who tell you that the other is your enemy when really it's actually the people in power. So yeah, that was the first time I really started to embed that within the shows, sort of the last sort of uh eight, eight years or so, five to eight years at Hackney. Um, and that sort of ended with the last one I did at Hackney, which was the Windrush one, where you know, and I don't see that as a political statement at all. It that was about celebrating a community, celebrating the contribution of a community, and it was very obvious that that the story of Dick Whittington lended itself so beautifully to someone from outside coming into London and thinking that the the streets were paved with gold, and indeed the people in in the Caribbean were told that, you know, come, come, you know, we need you, come, we need you to rebuild, and then they come and that and and they're basically you know vilified for coming, and then all those years later that they're still fighting for justice, and that was at the time of that, and so I felt very strongly in obviously my in-laws and I'd heard all the stories, so I I'd promised Sharon's mum I would write it. Unfortunately, she passed away before I managed to get it within the cycle. I managed to do it, which long passed, but I I was very proud of it because I'd wanted to celebrate it. But I used to it it it and then I did it again at Catford last year and tweaked it for Catford, but um, it was still basically the same premise. And it was amazing how many people that year, like when I did it at Hackney, everybody was celebrating it. This time, suddenly it was like you're being really political, aren't you? You're being really political. And I was like, Since when is telling the truth being political? It's this is just a a story of truth of these people that came over and did what they did, and we are better for it. And it was amazing how suddenly that sentiment was seen as being political, which I think is not right, isn't it?

SPEAKER_03 42:40

I totally agree with you, and I think there's a couple of things there that are really important, and yeah, everybody when they talk about panto think of it as a a knockabout gag fest of you know messing about and stuff like that. But there are there are key elements. The story is absolutely key for a start, the narrative, but also like all theatre, you have to play the truth and it has to be relevant, you have to be able to relate to it in some way, whether that's the moral, the characters, or whatever. And and your Dick Whittington had all of that and more.

SPEAKER_01 43:13

Oh, thank you. And I was very proud of it. I was very, very proud of it. And I and I only really like theatre where I care. It doesn't matter what it is, whether that's pantomime, whether that's something at the national, whether that's something at the RSC or whatever. I I need to care. I need to the concept isn't enough for me. I need to understand where I am and care. And pantomime is no different, really. You need to know where you are, you need to know, understand the characters, and you need to relate to at least some of those characters, you know, and understand them. And and and I and I I love the fact that you know young people have an incredibly innate feeling of right and wrong, anyway. The more you live in the society, the more you you your morals get pulled away. It's fascinating that I remember the first time I didn't kill the giant, and I I didn't kill the giant because I never I've never killed anything in pantomimes that I've written. And and but trust me, as principal boy, I killed a lot of people. And and and I decided at Hackney I didn't want to do that because the people the the kids were living that the the reality for young people in Hackney at that time in the 90s was that they were on the front line of knife crime, of of of the post-code wars, of of of it being a very dangerous place. And I still think that the we don't we underestimate how much that affects young people. I so I stopped killing anything. So I remember the first time I killed the didn't kill the giant. Even some of the actors were like, but they're not this this is crazy, Suze, because you're giving the audience the choice whether to kill him or not, and you're not gonna kill him. And I said, No, I trust the fact that the audience by the time I've told the story, the audience will not want to kill the giant. And the kids never did. The kids never, ever, ever shouted to Jack to kill the giant. And I think that's really telling. And I trusted them, and I was right. I mean, it was scary, but I was right. They understood where the giant was coming from, you know.

SPEAKER_03 45:08

Look, I'd love to talk to you for much, much longer, and it'd be lovely to get you back on a future episode if you if you'd be up for that.

SPEAKER_02 45:15

I'd love to talk about it.

SPEAKER_03 45:15

But it's been absolutely fascinating chatting, Susie, and we've only really scratched the surface of your incredible career and your thoughts on Panto in general. But thank you so much for talking to us.

SPEAKER_01 45:26

Thank you too. It's been really delightful. Thank you so much, Martin.

SPEAKER_03 45:30

And that's it for now. Don't forget to subscribe through your favourite podcast app, spread the word to anybody you know who loves pantomime. And next time I'll be looking at another stock pantomime title when Imagine's joint CEO, Steve Bowden, and actor, playwright and director Fraser Boyle join me to discuss The Little Mermaid. That's in episode 138 of Just Imagine.

SPEAKER_00 45:52

Thank you for listening to the latest edition of Just Imagine, the podcast series from Imagine Theatre. And you can find out more by going to www.imagine theatre.co.uk