The Guardian 5 December 2021

After what happened this year, you could have forgiven the team behind the King’s panto if they had had a wobble. The death of Andy Gray from coronavirus in January at the age of 61 was not only a personal loss for his fellow actors Allan Stewart and Grant Stott but also the end of a longstanding panto institution. The triple act of Stewart, the dame, Stott, the baddie, and Gray, the clown, reigned supreme here for the best part of two decades.

The audience knows this too. The most moving moment of Sleeping Beauty comes when the lead actors pay tribute to “King Andy”, a man who, like a benign theatrical ghost, has the power even now to give the show a happy ending. The moment earns the most sustained applause of the night. [READ MORE]

By Mark Fisher

MARK FISHER is a freelance theatre critic and feature writer based in Edinburgh and has written about theatre in Scotland since the late-1980s. He is a theatre critic for The Guardian, a former editor of The List magazine and a frequent contributor to the Scotsman and other publications. He is the co-editor of the play anthology Made in Scotland (1995), and the author of The Edinburgh Fringe Survival Guide (2012) and How to Write About Theatre (2015) – all Bloomsbury Methuen Drama. He is also the editor of The XTC Bumper Book of Fun for Boys and Girls and What Do You Call That Noise? An XTC Discovery Book (both Mark Fisher Ltd).