The Rock n Roll Panto Cinderella at the Liverpool Playhouse

IT WAS with several saxophones, a battery of loaded water pistols and a barrel of fart jokes that the Everyman panto turned up at its neighbour.

The set may have been bigger, the tricks whizzier and the surroundings fancier, but there was no mistaking the famous rock 'n' roll pantomime in action.

This year, writing team Sarah A Nixon and Mark Chatterton have waved their magic wands over Cinderella, turning the age-old rags to riches story into a madcap musical in which love takes a back-seat to friendship.

The coach and horses is replaced by a pink car and the fairy godmother pushed out for the less conventional Poppy Pumpkin (Kate Marlais), who has her own ideas about magic.

Buttons even gets the girl, although it might not be the one he thought he wanted at the outset.

But, although Cinderella: Mop! In the Name of Love is no traditional panto, like all fairy tales it comes with its own set of rules, familiar to Everyman Christmas regulars and exaggerated especially for the Playhouse.

Francis Tucker returned as his ninth dame in a row, ugly sister Wilhelmina Macbeeth, with his partner in crime Adam Keast (Titiana Macbeeth) pulling on a dress, well dresses, for the first time in his more than a decade with the show.

The pair giggled, trumpeted, danced and horrified their way to the audience's hearts, if not Prince Charming's, in a range of increasingly ridiculous outfits including a dress resembling a sheep (“I'm Lady Baa Baa”) and one covered in liquorice all-sorts.

Rivalling them for best comedy duo were LIPA graduate Robert Gilbert as the prince enjoying his gap year and Jonny Bower as his assistant Danny Deeny, determined to find him a bride in a gameshow-style ball.

Fortunately, Cinders (Sarah Vezmar) is at hand, in a glittering jellyfish of a frock, giving them just enough time to fall in love before midnight.

While the rock 'n' roll panto belongs at the Everyman, the team proved the format works nearly as well elsewhere.