Tim relishes fourth appearance in Hastings’ White Rock panto

He’s been fortunate in that the work has been flooding in since things have started to open up.

“I am just so busy with work at the moment. But I am not moaning about it! I’m just riding the wave. You don’t know when things are going to stop again. In this business it is all about opportunities and making sure that you take them. Because I do so many different things within the business, everything seems to be landing at the moment and you have just got to go with it. We just don’t know if there’s going to be another mutation or if things might get worse. You have just got to do it while you can.”

And for the moment, that means making his fourth appearance in Hastings’ White Rock panto, Robin Hood, December 15-31).returning this Christmas in his usual role as the dame – hot on the heels of an appearance in November at the Stables Theatre in his solo show, Sondheim Divas.

“I love Hastings. I love the audience. And it is nice as a dame to know that the audience like what you are doing. I always love being asked to go back which is lovely. It is a compliment. For me a dame is a man in a frock. It is not it’s about trying to be a woman. It’s very traditional and no one knows how long that tradition will last with different gender casting happening now. Who knows what will happen and how long the dame can carry on. I think it would be a shame if it stopped. I played dame for the first time in 11 years ago in Hereford. I was working with a choreographer and the team were looking for a dame. I was in my 30s and I wondered if I was too young but I did it and I loved it and I spent four glorious years as the dame in Hereford.

“The dame is there for a lot of reasons. The majority of the time she is the mother of the goodie. I always think that relationship with the goodie is very important. You have to get the truth of that relationship. You have to treat the goody as your child and in fact all the actors that I have played mum to over the years don’t call me Tim. They still call me mummy! Being mumsy is a big part of being dame. I always make sure that my dame is very protective of her sons and again that’s the truth of it. It’s the relationship and that’s the most important thing. My dame is northern and very rough. I sort of based her on my gran. She was from the north-east where I am from originally and I remember my brother said to me after he saw me as dame for the first time ‘There’s an element of granny in your performance!’ Sadly she passed away before I started my dame.”

Hastings is all part of the return after the pandemic: “Last year was just horrific. I did some things in the summer of 2020. Obviously there was no panto but I managed to do a Christmas show at the Cockpit Theatre which was called A Perfect Christmas. It was really jolly four-part harmony, traditional songs for Christmas. It was a lot of fun and some gorgeous singing. We managed to do that for a week before we got closed down which was really hard.”