CBeebies favourite Rebecca Keatley is back at the Swansea Grand this Christmas, playing Snow White on the stage where she once performed with its youth theatre.
She calls the theatre “home from home”, and says it has taken “many, many years of doing panto all around the country to finally be back in Wales”.
Keatley, who grew up in Port Talbot, was a member of the Swansea Grand Youth Theatre and remembers putting on Godspell there.
She said: “I don’t think I’d ever performed in such a big space before. It was incredible.”
She also sang in a show for the Grand’s birthday, with original songs she believes were written by John Quirk, this year’s panto musical director.
She cannot wait to see him again. “He was a legend then, and he’s even more of a legend now,” she said.
Panto runs in the family for Port Talbot’s Snow White
Her mum often played the lead in pantos in Port Talbot, and Keatley thinks she played Snow White one year.
She said: “My sister, me and my mum all used to do panto together. It’s a happy place for me.”
Her favourite panto memory is from Worthing, where comedian Vikki Stone made her laugh so much that every night she would “cry off my fake eyelashes as Princess Jasmine”.
Being home this year means time off with family and friends, and with her two-year-old daughter, Mabel.
Snow White at the Grand: the Wicked Queen, the Spirit of the Forest and the Dame in the Mirror
Snow White, she says, “always sees the best in everyone, and she also brings out the best in everyone”. She added: “I think we need more of that in the world today.”
She worked with Suzanne Shaw last year and calls her “absolutely brilliant”. Shaw, the Wicked Queen, has already said she wants the boos.
Owain Wyn Evans plays the Spirit of the Forest, and Keatley wants to see him after his Children in Need challenge, “to see if he can even walk properly!”
His 400-mile ride for Children in Need finishes in Cardiff on 13 November.
Christian Patterson directs the show and plays the Queen’s henchman. Keatley says he will “bring another dimension to the whole show”.
Kev Johns, the Grand’s dame for more than 30 years, appears as the Dame in the Mirror while he recovers from his stroke.
Snow White runs at the Swansea Grand from 5 December
Snow White runs from 5 December to 3 January.
It is produced by Imagine Theatre, with tickets through the Grand’s box office.
Asked to sum the show up in three words, Keatley said: “Uplifting, spectacular, joyous.”
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