Belle calls Laguna Beach home this holiday season as Laguna Playhouse and Lythgoe Family Panto treat SoCal audiences to Beauty And The Beast: A Christmas Rose, the funniest and most pop-hits-filled version yet of the classic 18th-century conte de fées.

 The fairy tale being recounted down Laguna way is every bit “as old as time” as the one Disney brought to animated life in 1991, but this time round it’s told in the uniquely British theatrical genre known as panto, an amalgam of a beloved children’s bedtime story, English Music Hall, pop culture references, audience participation, magic effects and transformations, and enough double entendre humor to make the show as enjoyable for adults as it is for kids.

The “Beauty” of Beauty & the Beast: A Christmas Rose (written by Kris Lythgoe) is of course Belle (Ashley Argota), the book-loving daughter of Parisian merchant Marcel (Andrew Barnicle), who having lost all of his gold-filled ships in an ocean storm, has set up shop in a charming seaside French village just west of Costa Mesa.

 Serving as our guide to Belle’s romantic adventures is “Laguña” librarian Dame Derrier (Roland Rusinek in drag), the genre’s requisite “Panto Dame,” whose plethora of puns is matched only by those spouted by Gus (Riley Costello), besotted teen sidekick to Captain Gus (Heath Calvert), the 6’4″ hunk he unabashedly adoringly dubs “the sexiest man in Laguna.”

 When news arrives that one of Marcel’s ships has been located, Belle’s father heads off for Paris, a destination he never reaches thanks to the pack of hungry wolves who soon have him seeking shelter in the castle our beastly antihero calls home.

Before long, Belle has gone in search of Papa, persuaded Beast (Thomas Hobson) to let her take his place, and been welcomed by palace chef Coco Chanel (Rusinek, looking awfully like Dame Derrier) and butler Louis Vuiton (David Engel), who inform her of the curse that turned their master into a monster and has kept them and the rest of the household staff prisoners.

 Now all Belle has to do is fall for Beast and this conte de toujours (that’s “tale as old as time” en français) will end happily ever after.

Following Lythgoe Family Panto tradition, Beauty And The Beast: A Christmas Rose features a selection of Top 40 radio’s Greatest Hits including the BeeGees’ “Staying Alive” (that has Gus singing and dancing his own praises), The Chainsmokers & Coldplay’s “Something Just Like This” (that has Belle declaring in no uncertain terms that she’s “not looking for somebody with some superhuman gifts”), and Beast and his backup wolves’ song-and-dance rendition of Maroon 5’s “Animals.”

 La La Land’s Mandy Moore choreographs one infectious music-video-ready showstopper after another, production numbers that feature the terrifically talented Cedric Dodd, Kelli Erdmann, Denae Luce, Alyse Rockett, and dance captain Darnell White Jr. and some adorable kid performers as well (Ava Abeyta, Fiona Agius, Hayden Luedde, Hunter Luedde, and Kennie Shen at the performance reviewed).

Sheldon Epps directs with the same joie de vivre he gave Beauty And The Beast: A Christmas Rose last year at the Pasadena Civic, his entirely recast septet of leads and Laguna Playhouse intimacy making its SoCal return even better than its debut.

 Argota is enchantment personified as a Belle who can give any pop star a run for her vocal money and more than enough feisty charm to captivate even a beast, that is if he’s got the inner beauty and power pipes that Hobson brings to the role.

 Calvert makes for a devastatingly handsome, deliciously self-centered Gus, whose true colors when revealed end up giving audiences the chance to hiss the villain in time-honored Panto tradition.

Not that Costello’s adorably spunky Pierre would ever boo the he-man of his dreams, and certainly not when scoring bonus points for hosting a kids-on-stage sequence with lucky “Golden Ticket” audience tots. (Bonus points for Costello’s interview skills and rapport with the wee ones who unanimously pick Pierre as their cast fave.)

The drag-o-licious Rusinek shows off operatic gifts (and the most outrageous wardrobe in town) as Dame Derrier, Engel’s Louis not only sports an accent français délicieux but proves himself quite the hand puppeteer, and Barnicle is a dotty delight as Marcel.

 Beauty And The Beast: A Christmas Rose looks fabulous thanks to Ian Wilson’s storybook set, Ablemarle’s outlandishly imaginative costumes, and Glenn Powell’s Technicolorful lighting design, and sounds terrific too thanks to musical director/one-man-orchestra Keith Harrison and sound designer Kate Wecker.

Annie Gratton is associate choreographer. Beast head design/build is by Swazzle Inc.

Casting is by Becky Lythgoe. “Pink Team” children Aubrey Abella, Sophia Domino, Zoey Garcia, Amaiyah Nauls, and Ashton Spaulding alternate with the “Red Team” reviewed here.

Beauty And The Beast: A Christmas Rose is produced by Lythgoe Family Panto & Jason Haigh-Ellery.

Vernon Willet is production stage manager and Carla Vigueras is assistant stage manager.

 At four consecutive Decembers and counting, Lythgoe Family Panto once again makes Laguna Playhouse the place to be in Orange County this Christmas, so get ready for some scrumdiddlyumptious holiday fun with Beauty And The Beast: A Christmas Rose.

The Laguna Playhouse, 606 Laguna Canyon Road, Laguna Beach.
www.LagunaPlayhouse.com

–Steven Stanley
December 7, 2018
Photos: Cathy Cunningham Photography

Tags: Laguna Playhouse, Orange County Theater Review, The Lythgoe Family