Ya Beauty and the Beast

What’s that? You want a coherent plot? In a Christmas show? Get with the programme, granddad. Ya Beauty and the Beast is panto for the AHD generation.

There’s a mysterious heatwave, a sombre principal girl who grows a beard and eventually turns into a dog, a camp flower called (yes) Pansy, a Jimmy Krankie tribute puppet, a badly-scripted quest set by the White Witch Gandolfi (first name Cathy), a family of flashing-eyed skeletons, a shark-powered waterski, a love duet by rap, a Tunnocks-sponsored circus, and one of the main characters is a kangaroo. There’s no room for a plot! Amazingly, though, it all works.

The Tron’s pantos have been veering into increasingly self-referential territory, always taking a snide and not altogether good-humoured swing at the other Glasgow theatres’ pantos, and often to the detriment of the entertainment value. This time though, even though they’ve probably got as little a clue as to what on earth is going on as the rest of us, the utterly excellent cast are thoroughly committed to the very serious pursuit of fun, led by Andy Clarke’s brilliant, charismatic saucepot dame Bunty Beautox.

Tron Theatre, Glasgow, until Sun 3 Jan