Dick Whittington is a great story for a panto script, providing loads of narrative drive from start to finish. Just look at all the steps in Dick’s story!
Dick arrives in London to seek his fortune.
Meets and befriends an amazingly ingenious cat (Tommy).
Finds work at Fitzwarren’s Stores.
Meets and falls in love with Alice, Fitzwarren’s daughter.
Is betrayed and wrongly accused of theft.
Banished by Fitzwarren.
Leaves London and starts to return home. Wakes from a sleep hearing the bells of London seeming to call him back and promising that he will be thrice Lord Mayor of London.
Returns to London and is recruited, together with his cat, on board a ship bound for North Africa.
Shipwrecked and washes up in Morocco.
Tommy defeats a plague of rats.
Dick is rewarded by the Sultan and sent back to London a rich man.
Reconciles with Fitzwarren.
Marries Alice.
Lives happily ever after!
Of course, all pantomime scripts need a strong storyline, but Dick Whittington is particularly obliging in this respect, which means that the action is always underpinned and moved along from one scene to the next, helping to keep the show tight amidst all the mayhem.
Traditionally, the dame in Dick Whittington is Sarah the Cook, so some sort of messy cooking routine is almost obligatory – and the role seems to lend itself to a dame who is splendidly warm hearted and vulgar.
Whether disguised as Cat Woman, trying to scare off the rats, or dressed in a fat suit and spangled bikini, as Idle Jack’s ‘glamorous conjuror’s assistant’, she is always deliciously inappropriate and great fun to play. (Quite why she’s dressed like this you’ll have to get a reading copy to find out. Spoiler alert – it’s in scene 8.)
I have always loved animals in pantomime and Dick Whittington offers a double helping in this respect.
The baddie, King (or Queen) Rat, speaks entirely in verse, occasionally plagiarises Shakespeare and channels their inner Mercutio in their ridiculously over the top death scene.
Tommy the Cat, by contrast, is silent, but hugely expressive. Brave, cunning, childlike but not a child, very human but not human, Tommy nearly always seems to inspire a good performance – and consequently nearly always seems to steal the show. (And the reviews, if the papers are in!)
When I originally wrote Dick Whittington, I was writing for a professional company who needed to keep the number of actors down – and my version for amateur companies has remained a perfect choice if you are looking for a pantomime script to suit a smaller cast.
However, alongside the characters mentioned above, there are some other lovely parts for your actors and audience to enjoy.
Idle Jack is a great role in the Buttons tradition. Stupider but more cunning than Buttons, he has some great comedy throughout the show – and Alderman Fitzwarren becomes a wonderful role, when doubled with his seafaring identical twin brother Captain Horation Fitzwarren, requiring ever more ludicrous high-speed doubling with increasingly comic effect.
All in all, Dick Whittington is a fun-filled, fastmoving, swashbuckling panto story with some lovely characters for your cast to get their teeth into.
I’ll conclude with the words of the traditional song which Dick hears as a message from the Bells of London.,,
Turn again Whittington,
Thou worthy citizen,
Lord Mayor of London!
Turn again Whittington,
Make all your dreams come true,
Thrice Mayor of London!
The message of renewal and redemption is pure pantomime!