Q 01/05

What do pantomime audiences shout when a ghost creeps up unseen on the dame and the comic?

A) Watch your back!

B) Turn around now!

C) Look out above!

D) He's behind you!

Answer · why

D) He's behind you!

'He's behind you!' is built on the bench gag: the dame and the comic sit singing a cheerful song to forget their fears while a ghost circles behind th...

Q 02/05

Who traditionally plays the pantomime dame, the over-the-top matriarch in big hair and heavy make-up?

A) A veteran actress

B) A man in drag

C) A teenage girl

D) A circus clown

Answer · why

B) A man in drag

A man in drag has played the dame since at least 1806, when Samuel Simmons took such a part in London, and the joke depends on it: the audience is mea...

Q 03/05

Who traditionally plays the pantomime principal boy, the hero of the story?

A) A leading man

B) A young woman

C) A character actress

D) A male dancer

Answer · why

B) A young woman

A young woman played the hero as an accepted convention by the late 19th century, when music hall stars such as Vesta Tilley and Marie Lloyd took the ...

Q 04/05

By a convention from medieval mystery plays, from which side does the pantomime villain enter?

A) Stage left

B) Stage right

C) Upstage

D) Downstage

Answer · why

A) Stage left

Stage left stood for Hell in the medieval mystery plays, so the villain enters there while the good fairy comes in from stage right, the side of Heave...

Q 05/05

On which day did Victorian pantomimes customarily open, binding the form to the family Christmas?

A) Christmas Eve

B) New Year's Day

C) Twelfth Night

D) Boxing Day

Answer · why

D) Boxing Day

Boxing Day was opening night, and the grandest Victorian productions at Drury Lane then ran from Christmas to Easter.