My partner and I’s first big holiday away together was in London. It was around this time of year in 2022.
We visited the Royal Opera House and National Theatre, the V&A, the Natural History Museum and the National Portrait Gallery. Basically, the London stuff that I hadn’t done before.
We also went to Highgate Cemetery – I know what you’re thinking; awkward place for a first date. But cemeteries are fascinating places to learn about history and places, both in London and at home.
Among the famous dead, like George Michael, Marx and Douglas Adams, I stopped at the gravestone of one Frank Matcham. I’m still not sure what really made me stop. If it was just chance, or whether it was just on a prominent path, or the subconscious twigged on a buried bit of information that I wouldn’t have recalled otherwise.
I was convinced the name meant something to me and that I’d heard it before – and I absolutely had.
Frank Matcham, if you don’t know, was a designer of theatres more than a century ago and he just so happened to have designed, among others, His Majesty’s Theatre, Rosemount Viaduct, Aberdeen.
Strangely, stumbling over this grave on a showery, mild November morning is a fond memory for me, even beyond just being an early treasure of something Lou and I did together.
Proof that somehow the bits and bobs of home manage to follow you around, jumping over your shoulder when you don’t expect it.
HMT architect set the bar high for the arts in Aberdeen
Hired by Robert Arthur to design His Majesty’s, Matcham was responsible for the designs of more than 90 theatres during a period of boom for the industry. He refurbished around 80 more. His imprint across the UK’s towns and cities is remarkable.
I thought about it on Saturday afternoon while sitting down ready to take in this year’s panto at His Majesty’s, Jack and the Beanstalk.
Very nearly two years since seeing his stone, I was sitting in the dress circle designed by Matcham, with an envious view of a stage, madness soon to unfold.
I know what you’re thinking – awkward moment to think about a gravestone, immediately before the daftest two hours of entertainment I’ve seen in quite some time. But, both things are monuments to the talents of an architect from 100 years ago, in their own way.
This was the first time I’ve been to a panto in God knows how long – probably since I was a bairn.
Like everything else, there’s a lot you forget about panto in that time. The only thing I truly remembered was how it is a harbinger of Christmas festivities. It’s December now, for sure.
What had I forgotten? How absolutely disgustingly filthy the jokes are. The bawdiness zoomed so quickly over all the kids’ heids that their hair nearly parted as it passed.
I’d forgotten how ably the cracks are written, to keep them relevant to modern life, now including TikTok.
Aberdeen panto is ingrained in city’s heritage
I’d forgotten the sheer gusto that everyone gets into it with. Gary: Tank Commander, Alan McHugh, Paul Corrgian and the rest of the cast – including homegrown talents playing Jack and Jill – were an absolute riot.
I’ve a newfound appreciation for the athletic prowess of an actor in a heavy cow suit performing a slapstick routine – all that mooooving around; it must have been udderly knackering. Excuse me.
Once Jack, Jill and the rest had climbed up the titular beanstalk, the giant was brought to life by 3D visuals, an addition since the days Frank Matcham was building the stages.
I won’t spoil the scare but the kids in the audience were going bonkers. Good clean fun, fart jokes aside.
The audience was bowled over by the charmingness of it all, both adults and kids alike.
Total entertainment, pure, brash and funny. Perfect for the season, and a relief from the more serious side of life. Only a few more weeks of it to go until the Christmas break.
It was all a brilliant reminder of how spoiled for choice Aberdeen is for performance, theatre and dance.
There are three different pantos in the city that you can in take this year, at HMT, Tivoli and the Arts Centre. How embedded performing arts have become in the city since Frank Matcham built one of his many theatres here in 1906.
If you get the chance, get yourself down to the panto and celebrate a huge part of Aberdeen’s history; theatrical, dramatic and inspiring.
A testament to Christmas, to Frank Matcham and, maybe most importantly, your local history and heritage, which I hope will follow you, wherever you may go.
Colin Farquhar works as a creative spaces manager and film programmer in the north-east culture sector
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