By Martin Banks

It’s that time of the year again…oh, yes it is.

In the best traditions of what is an annual tradition, a Belgian audience will get the chance to enjoy pantomime this month.

The Antwerp based theatre company BATS (British American Theatrical Society) is putting on a performance of Brabo and the Giant this weekend but if you want to catch it you’d better move quickly as tickets are selling fast.

The show is packed with songs, laughter, audience participation and all the traditional panto fun. In other words, a perfect family show.

This particular panto tells the story of young Brabo as he works day and night in Dame Estrella’s famous bakery  (home of the best buns in Antwerp). But trouble’s never far away… the sly businessman Maximillian De Vos will stop at nothing to take over the bakery. With his daughter Marie caught in the middle, Max hatches an evil plan.

Can Brabo save the bakery, win Marie’s heart, and protect Antwerp from the most cunning villain the city’s ever known?

That may be unsure but what is certain is a laugh-out-loud, sing-along adventure packed with toe-tapping songs, cheeky gags, and all the traditional pantomime fun many of us know and love. With larger-than-life characters, sparkling costumes, and plenty of chances for the audience to join in, it’s the perfect treat for the whole family.

It all takes place this Saturday 17 January (7.30pm) and Sunday 18 January (1pm and 5.30pm) at Mark Liebrecht Schouwburg Heilig-Kruisstraat 16, 2640 Mortsel, just south of Antwerp.

For those unfamiliar with the tradition (and this will apply to many in Belgium), pantomimes are embedded in British culture and are considered a “must” for many British families for tradition and laughs. Pantomime is anything but a “mime” as the name may suggest. Instead, it’s a loud, fun, enjoyable musical comedy theatre production.

It takes well-loved children’s classic tales like Cinderella, Snow White, Dick Whittington, Aladdin and turns them into a show full of giggles for kids and plenty of laughs for adults too with those subtle adult-minded jokes. Audience participation is greatly encouraged.

Pantomime (or just “panto”) gets its roots from 15th and 16th-century traditions of Commedia dell Arte, an early form of Italian theatre. The “formula” for those productions are the same for British pantomime, explains Britain in Antwerp.

The main male role, it goes on to state, is often played by a woman, a “Panto Dame” is a man in drag, there is always a sidekick of some sort as well, there is a comedic animal involved, as for the cow in Jack and the Beanstalk and, although the stories may be classics, the jokes are always contemporary so that they are understood by the modern.

Of course, what makes the panto is audience participation.

Britain in Antwerp recalls how the Victorians turned the show into two halves: the fairy tale and harlequinade where the characters “transform” with the use of a magic wand. The usage of trap doors and secret switches dazzled Victorian audiences and is still loved by children today.

BATS itself goes back as far as 1956, when English speaking members of the Cercle Laetitia Company (CLC) decided to form their own company with the express purpose of performing British and American plays in the English language.

In order to raise the necessary funds, members would ‘tour’ the local bars and cafes delighting mainly Flemish audiences with impromptu sketches and singing.

Within seven weeks of BATS being formed their first play, Murder Without Crime by J. Lee Thomson, was performed on 28 April. It was apparently performed in the auditorium of the, now defunct, General Motors building on the Noorderlaan.

In the early days, BATS productions were performed for one night only, with the exception of the annual pantomime, which usually had three performances.

The pantomime first appeared at the end of 1958 and was very often written by club members and the directing debuts of two current, long-standing members were made – Jo Royen taking charge of “We Must Kill Toni” by Ian Stuart Black in February 1960, and Paul Roche with “Out of the Crocodile” by Giles Cooper in October 1965.

Further info on Brabo and the Giant is available at: https://www.batsantwerp.be/productions/brabo-and-the-giant