We’ve just got back from taking our son to see Sleeping Beauty at our local theatre, and on the way home my wife mentioned that an Australian colleague of hers had never heard of a pantomime before.
This got me wondering, are pantomimes or similar things a thing in the US?
For those that don’t know what a pantomime is they’re plays aimed at young children, normally based on fairy tales, sleeping beauty, jack and the bean stalk, beauty and the beast, Cinderella etc.
There are a few things which are common to most, if not all, pantomimes: lots of audience interaction “he’s behind you” “oh no he isn’t” “oh yes he is”, a man in drag, in a lot of stories the male protagonist is often played by a woman, and normally a z list celeb.
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No, we have similar children’s entertainment but British-style pantomimes generally aren’t a thing here.
I’m sure you could find one if you looked, but no, they’re not popular or common and most Americans probably only know the word “pantomime” as a term for (silently) acting something out, like in charades.
Nope. Just a Brit thing.
We’ve got children’s theaters, but nothing that would really fit the definition of a pantomime.
No, that is a very British thing. There are theater shows at Christmas time, but without any of the audience interaction or tropes of the British pantomime.
Heard of them but I’ve never seen them in this country.
No, those are very British.
Pantomime doesn’t have that meaning in American English. We only use pantomime for a soundless performance like charades or the (stereotypically) French clown show with a white faced silent performer. Often shortened to ‘mime’.
I did drama competitions in school, Pantomime was a category, but it’s non verbal, to music and you were expected to wear the white and black makeup.
Hmm, there are theatrical productions aimed at children that variably include elements that you’re mentioning (audience engagement, central staging on an adult narrator who is painting the scene and who may be a local celeb, youthful male protagonists often played by females, visual gags) but nothing culturally exactly like that. Here, pantomimes are explicitly associated with nonspeaking theater, which isn’t terribly popular in the US to begin with
>For those that don’t know what a pantomime is they’re plays aimed at young children, normally based on fairy tales, sleeping beauty, jack and the bean stalk, beauty and the beast, Cinderella etc.
>There are a few things which are common to most, if not all, pantomimes: lots of audience interaction “he’s behind you” “oh no he isn’t” “oh yes he is”,
We have theater plays for children with all of those things where I live.
>a man in drag, in a lot of stories the male protagonist is often played by a woman, and normally a z list celeb.
Not this stuff though.
They’re rare, but they exist – there’s a company in Southern California that’s been doing them for quite a while.
We have a lot of children’s theatre, but I wouldn’t call it pantomimes. Many community theatres have a children’s season that runs concurrently with their main stage season.
They are a very niche thing here but they do exist.
Sometimes a cool theater will one, and I have seen one, but really it’s very British and I only know it because I have a British partner
We don’t have pantomimes except the audience interaction at Rocky Horror films. For children, there are plays of Cinderella and the Nutcracker – they’re musicals but don’t have that interactive aspect. There’s puppet theaters as well, some that can be set up in the gym of a preschool or kindergarten, and they might be a little more interactive.
No, usually kid’s theater at Christmas is a performance of the Nutcracker. We also have Christmas pageants that kids participate in (a la Charlie Brown’s Christmas Special)
Is that what people in Philly do?
I have been to one Christmas panto in my life, about twelve years ago in Los Angeles, but it was explicitly understood as a British cultural import.
they are! not very popular overall but in Philly (large theater scene) there are multiple theaters that do yearly pantos. source: i work in theater
Nope. People in the U.S. will be puzzled if you use the term and think you are talking about mimes. You can find children’s theater productions but they aren’t common like pantos, and don’t have that same kind of audience participation theming.
I know I’m an outlier, but I performed in pantos for many years! They certainly exist here, just not terribly common.
I know the term pantomime from my time in theatre classes in high school/college but it was used for a silent performance, not a children’s play.
There is children’s theater in the US and it does often include the “He’s BEHIND you!” style audience participation, but it isn’t hugely popular and isn’t called pantomime. We only use that to mean imitating the action of something silently, like a mime like Marcel Marceau.
Like “While my mom was talking on the phone, she pantomimed writing to get me to bring her a pen and paper.”
“Puppet ministry” was a big thing at a lot of churches here in the 80s and 90s and it usually involved a particular off-brand Muppet style of puppet and the very young audience shouting at the puppets, who would talk directly to them or wonder aloud about things the audience knew the answers. This is what I am reminded of when I see most interactive children’s theater.
i only know what a pantomime somewhat is b/c i’ve watched father brown, which is a british tv show set in the 1950s. i remember it was on or around christmas day and they were putting on a performance of cinderella. it seems like they do a humorous take on things.
Yes, there’s a theater near me that does them but I don’t believe it’s a very common thing nationwide.
https://www.peopleslight.org/about/new-plays-projects/holiday-pantos-productions/
I’ve seen them here before, but they’re usually presented as “here’s a taste of a British Christmas tradition” rather than something that everyone already knows about.