The art of the panto dame

There is nothing more panto than a dame. The grandmother of today’s dames is Dan Leno (1860–1904), a champion clog dancer and music-hall performer, not much taller than Ronnie Corbett. He was preceded by others, notably James Rogers, who in 1861, in Aladdin,played a character called Widow Twankey, named after a cheap and revolting tea. But Leno was the first modern prototype dame – a befuddled genius in a frock with a fantastic line in patter. He created the role of Mother Goose in a play written for him by J. Hickory Wood and starred in a legendary run of 16 pantos at Drury Lane that finished him. He died insane and an alcoholic at the age of 43 – a warning to his artistic descendants.

Fast forward to Theatre Royal Plymouth, 1992. Les Dawson is playing Ada the cook in Dick Whittington with russet hair buns and his trademark grimace: ‘Good evening, boys and girls of all ages’… pause while he adjusts a buttock… ‘My piles are killing me.’ The laughter ricocheted off the gods. Dawson’s dame was indebted to Norman Evans, a northern dame much adored in his day and apparently also fond of oversharing medical complaints.

Mother Goose is this year’s panto at the Hackney Empire, a haunt of Leno’s and one of the most beautiful theatres in the world. It was Mother Goose that established a style of cross-dressed performance which, with a nod to the downtrodden everywhere and a sweet pathos, can still be seen in Hackney’s resident Dame, Clive Rowe. Mother Goose is for him the big one, ‘simply because it’s the only panto that’s all about the dame. It’s her story.’