When it comes to creating the sets, props and costumes for Durban’s annual grand family pantomime, multi-award-winning local designer Greg King and his ace, hard-slogging team are always pushed to the max … but are also always in their element.
This year is no exception – and marks the 10th panto King has designed.
Assisted by a team including Wendy Henstock, Bongumusa Masondo and Sarah Matter, King is delighted to be pulling out all the stops, in a kaleidoscope of neon colours, to create an original version of the Puss in Boots fairy tale for his and partner Steven Stead’s KickstArt company.
The sumptuous production runs from December 4 to January 10 at the Elizabeth Sneddon Theatre.
Written and directed by Stead, Puss in Boots will be set on an enchanted tropical island where the audience will get to meet not only the famous feline in footwear – played by Rory Booth, who was the high-camp Donkey in KickstArt’s Shrek The Musical earlier this year – but also a host of fun new characters.
Among them is a blond Bryan Hiles as Puss’s hapless surfer-dude owner, Tom; Darren King as Tom’s outrageous mother, Dame Marzipan, the village baker; and the ever-amusing Peter Court as the dastardly Grimsby Withergood, a goblin wizard.
We also get Belinda Henwood as quirky good fairy Calypso Honeybunch; Londiwe Dhlomo as the adventurous Princess Miranda; Caitlin Kilburn as slinky feline spy Selina Swiftclaw; Lyle Buxton as a fun, Johnny Bravo-like mill owner; and Nhlakanepho Manqele as the jocular king of the enchanted island.
“Steven had the fantastic idea of setting our version of Puss in Boots in the Caribbean, and it features five settings,” says King.
“We get the marketplace on the island of Malfortun, a magical fairy grotto and an ogre’s dungeon … all bursting with tropical DayGlo colours. Perfect for the summer holidays!”
He goes on to mention sets heavy with snaking vines, hibiscus and frangipani, as well as a ballroom in a royal palace and a wizard’s weird, colourful laboratory.
The pantomime’s ogre is really a wicked goblin who is a shape-shifter, King explains, so a lot of the magic tricks and special effects he has had to build are for the character’s crazy transformations on stage.
Asked about the magnitude of his task, he smiles and shrugs.
“Hundreds of metres of calico were sewn up into the huge backdrops by the wonderful ladies at Rhoda’s Curtains in Umgeni Road. And then we had many litres of paint in all the colours of the rainbow.”
“ I don’t know what the hardware store thinks I’m up to. This year I’ve spent a fortune on masses of fluorescent colours which give the show its tropical punch.
“Fabric, sequins, feathers and glitter are regular items on my shopping list at this time of year – so luckily all the Christmas decorations come out just in time.
“The other thing we spend a fortune on is glue. Buckets and buckets of wood glue, contact glue, polystyrene glue and hundreds of hot-glue sticks. There’s never enough!”
The biggest challenge with a large show like this is to create smooth, fluid scene-changes, says King: “It’s one thing to dream up a big, fabulous set for each scene, but how to store everything else in the wings and fly tower, and to change it all around in a few moments while the curtains are closed, is extremely complicated.
“Thank goodness for our tireless stage crew who push, pull and carry all through the hot summer and make it look so magical.”
King says he counts himself lucky to be using the Playhouse Company’s Mayville workshops to paint the pantomime’s big backdrops.
“We have a storeroom near the Stables Market, but it is so full these days that it is often quicker to build whatever we need, rather than try to find it in there. Crazy, I know.
“Storage is always a problem after a show, so trying to recycle old stuff and make it look unrecognisable is another challenge when designing a new production.”
He smiles broadly when asked what he would say to people to encourage them to see this year’s pantomime.
“We often have people come up to us after the panto and say: ‘It gets better every year!’ which is extremely flattering. But although we do try, I think the real secret is that the panto is such a sensory overload that people forget whatever they’ve seen before as they fall under its magical spell.
“I sincerely hope Puss in Boots will do the same. A lot of people don’t know the story, but it’s chock full of good guys and bad guys, comedy, dancing and magic.”
The production features such popular songs as Debarge’s Rhythm of the Night, Michael Bublé’s Sway, Katy Perry’s Roar and Ricky Martin’s La Vida Loca.
Shows are at 2.30pm Tuesday to Sunday, and 7pm on Fridays and some Saturdays. Tickets cost R120 to R220 at Computicket.