REVIEW: DICK WHITTINGTON @ THEATRE ROYAL PLYMOUTH

🎭 Dick Whittington

📍  The Lyric, Theatre Royal Plymouth, Royal Parade, Plymouth, Devon, PL1 2TR

🗓 Tuesday 16th December 2025

⭐️⭐️⭐️

DAZZLING BUT DATED

Dazzling costumes, talented ensemble and a cute, cartwheeling cat along with the now legendary Samuel Holmes, Panto season 2025/2026 has arrived at Theatre Royal Plymouth and I am excited! A long-time fan of the traditional Pantomime it is always a special family time.

The show opens with the deliciously villainous Queen Rat and her terrifying boss who proceed to cackle their way through the expected threats to our hero and our city accompanied by happy booing from the capacity audience. A great start, we settle in to enjoy ourselves.

Switching to the sunlit uplands of a town, Plymouth or maybe London, it is unclear. Happy, dancing townsfolk are bemoaning the plague of rats. Two of those affected are the lovely Alice and this year’s Dame, her mum, Sarah the Cook who jointly own the sweetshop much targeted by the aforementioned rats. If only there were a hero to rid them of this plague!

Enter Dick! Yep that last pretty much sums up the next 20 minutes of unrelenting jests around our hero’s name which hopefully flew over the heads of the youngest audience members. Shane Richie as “Richard Whittington, known as Dick”, quickly engages with the audience amid gales of laughter. There is much banter as he meets Sam, the Spirit of the Bow Bells who encourages him to fulfil the prophecy that he will become Lord Mayor of London. Samuel Holmes as Sam is his usual underplaying, brilliant self, arrayed in a myriad elaborate costumes which do seem to hamper his movements. Nevertheless, he is the star of the show for me.

I don’t think it would be a spoiler to say that is the plot really. I am not sure pantomime needs a detailed narrative, this did seem a little thin even so, with a quite few glossed over bits. Some of the writing seems to date from 1975 rather than 2025 which is disappointing especially for the female audience. The Panto also morphs into the Shane Richie Show on occasions which jarred with me. The sound was inconsistent, so many of Alice and the Dame Sarah’s words are lost which given how hard they work is annoying.

To sum up: if you want a fast-paced, sparkly Panto with every single panto trope thrown in, have older children and enjoy old fashioned jokes, DICK WHITTINGTON fits the bill.

Rosie Sharman-Ward

All views are my own and I pride myself on being honest, fair and free from influence. Theatre is subjective and it is important to remember that all views expressed are just those of one person.

My ticket for this performance of Dick Whittington was gifted by Theatre Royal Plymouth who invited me to watch the show on behalf of Pink Prince Theatre in exchange for my honest review. The fact that my ticket was gifted played no part in the content of my review or the star rating given.

CAST LIST:

Shane Richie as Dick Whittington; Samuel Holmes as Spirit of the Bow Bells; Anne Smith as Queen Rat; Emily Beth Harrington as Alice Fitzwarren; Iain Stuart Robinson as Sarah the Cook; Kira McPherson as Kitty Cat

Ensemble: Lucy-Mae Baker, Jaycee Bell, Oliver Craven, Harvey Morris, Arjun

Mudahar, Lauren Pierce, Lucy Surgeon, Layla-Grace Vrahimis, The Theatre Royal

Junior Ensemble

RUNNING TIME (approx):

2 hours, including interval

>> CLICK HERE FOR DICK WHITTINGTON TICKETS <<

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