Ever since Cilla Black ill-advisedly ad-libbed in a Liverpool production of Jack and the Beanstalk (How shall I kill the giant, kids? answer: sing to him, Cilla) I have found panto completely unpredictable.

And there is nothing more varied than the reaction of a cast to newspaper reviews.
Printed reviews have the great advantage over their radio counterparts of being able to be read and re-read. If favourable they can be cut out, pasted into books, or even sent off to friends and relatives (not to mention agents).
However, when unfavourable, then the critic (who has been invited by the company in a hoped for bid to boost ticket sales) can be openly ridiculed and despised.
All of which can only lead to one logical conclusion: that these people, frequently body-snatched from deceased soap operas or even off the high street, do not want honest reviews. Rather, they want solicited commendations - something to soothe a faded ego when, in some cases, their careers have already gone down the pan.
This subjective sulking is at no time more in evidence than at Christmas, when thesps seem to presume that the spirit of goodwill has been extended to include critics being dishonest with the public.
And there is the even more confusing side-effect: those who claim never to read reviews seem to be the first to know when they are anything other than glowing.

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