How Evie intends to be "a proper panto princess" in Shoreham

“To be a proper panto princess, I think you have just got to be completely believable and the children have really got to be able to relate to you. I think it's really important that you completely play it straight and that you never break the character and that you are totally the princess throughout, the princess that all the children want you to be. It’s actually just one of those rules of how panto is formulated that the princess always stays in character. Everyone else will be stepping out of character and doing all sorts of fun things and funny things but you have got to play it straight and I do think that makes it more interesting. It certainly makes it more challenging. You cannot laugh!”

As for the character: “I think you've got to be kind and you've got to be very caring towards all the other characters and I think the key thing is that you've also got to be optimistic. Those are my three adjectives for the role!

“When I was younger I was a juve and I danced as well and I played the cat in Dick Whittington once at home in Lincolnshire. And then last year I worked with LP Creatives and we did Cinderella in Leatherhead. I was a dancer and I was also understudy Cinderella but I never did get to go on. She went right the way through and did every show so I never did it but I just loved it. I loved being part of it and I love my dancing.”

Which means that this is now her first principal role in professional panto: “And I'm really looking forward to it. It really will be fun to play the part every single night. I graduated from Laine Theatre Arts this summer. I trained through Covid. It was summer time in my first year when we all went home but we still managed it. We still continued the training but it was a very different experience. And it was really great to get the panto last year when I was still a student. We had just broken up for the Christmas holidays so I didn't miss anything which was great but I think that Covid was really really difficult for everybody and certainly being a student at that time was interesting and hardly the typical experience you would have expected.

“Since graduating I have kept training and working out and sticking to classes but really the hardest thing is just trying to stay in contact with my friends. But since I got the panto job I'm just building up to learning the lines and really looking forward to doing it. My family are all coming down at different intervals. Both my grannies are really excited about it and it's going to be lovely for them to come and visit. Everybody's going to come and watch but I do hope that I'll be able to get home for Christmas, driving back on Christmas Eve and getting up very early on Boxing Day. I think I will be more nervous when I know my family are in the audience.

"It is unnecessary added pressure that I'm putting on myself but at the same time it will be lovely to know that they are in the audience!”

Tickets from the Ropetackle.