Ali has entered the Green Room

Ali is the Marketing Manager at Watersmeet and she's popped into the Green Room
to share her thoughts with us.
And the picture on the left isn't rude but if you can think of any caption ideas do let us know!
This was taken in one of the dressing rooms and she's holding a piece of dame costume!



Watersmeet(wmt): How many pantos have you been a part of?
Ali: Aladdin will be my 21st professional panto.


wmt: What's been the best moment of rehearsals so far or the build up to opening night?
Ali: There's been loads. Seeing Matt Blossom try to dance was hilarious but working with Waitrose Rickmansworth on their community performance was very special. It was great to see so many new faces experience panto for the first time.


wmt: Have you had anything testing, tricky or particularly difficult to do this week or during the run?
Ali: Working on panto is always great fun and I get to do some really fun work with the cast in the build up to opening. I took the Citrus Brothers to five different schools to do assembly and they made me laugh so much I nearly wet my pants! Another funny moment was back in May when we entered the Ricky Carnival. We don't have a budget for things like that so we made a float from a Waitrose trolley, a washing machine from an old box, the box office ladies dressed up and we borrowed a man from the council to dress up as Widow Twankey. He'd never been a dame before and I had do to his make up, which was a first for me too. We laughed so much though and took first price in the commercial category for floats! You can see our carnival adventure on You Tube - just type in being dragged up!
wmt: If you had to identify to a character from Aladdin, who would it be and why?
Ali: Probably Abanazar because he's mean and moody but comes good in the end!
wmt: What's you favourite panto and why?
Ali: Cinderella because I was Cinders in a school panto, because its the easiest panto to sell and because when we did Cinderella last year, Mark Speight was our Buttons and we will always have very special memories of him and Natasha.
wmt: How will you be feeling at the opening performance of Aladdin and how will you feel when the curtain comes down on the final performance?
Ali: I was extremely nervous on the first night, in fact I'm nervous most times I watch the show because I want it to be a good and want everyone to enjoy it so it's hard to just watch it and enjoy it myself.
Once it's all over I always say never again but after 21 pantos I guess I don't mean it! It's pretty awful once all the cast have gone and the decorations have come down. The venue goes from being full of life with the cast around and a thousand people passing through the doors everyday to post Christmas blues and it's quite depressing but we start work on the next panto in February so in some ways it feels like a panto is for life...not just for Christmas!