Farcical Fairy Tale

Everybody knows -- or at least knows the basic outline of -- the story of Snow White.

Innocent girl. Evil stepmother. Seven tiny men. Check.

But it's likely that few have seen the classic fairy tale in quite the farcical, outlandish manner in which the British National Theatre of America will be telling it beginning next week.

For the production, which will be presented at the Horn Theatre at the College of Southern Nevada, BNTA co-founders Jo Cattell and Richard Perkin reimagine "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs" as a British pantomime, a theatrical form that dates back to the 18th century and employs song, dance, cross-dressed actors and actresses, off-kilter characters and plot lines, slapstick, and plenty of audience participation.

It's similar, Cattell offers, to the sort of thing you've seen in the movie "Shrek," complete with obvious jokes for kids to laugh at and lines that will fly over kids' heads but be easily captured by their parents'.

"British pantomime, that tradition is very much aimed at a family audience," Cattell notes.

Pantomime -- which, by the way, isn't related to mime -- is a holiday staple in Britain, Cattell notes, and typically feature familiar stories stretched into bizarre shapes and packed with an abundance of unexpected twists.

Here, while the basic story line of "Snow White" is followed, "we also have a lot of very random characters who kind of suddenly appear," Cattell says. "Like, Madonna makes an appearance."

BNTA's version of the tale also is set in Las Vegas, where the evil stepmother is a Strip megastar, Snow White is her put-upon but talented stage manager, and the dwarves -- miners in the original story -- now are employees of the Gold Mine Casino downtown. "Snow White" actually is BNTA's second pantomime. Its first, last year's "Cinderella," was, Cattell says, intended as nothing more than a one-off exercise directed at a presumed audience of mostly Southern Nevada British expats.

But, after that production brought "an amazing response that was quite unexpected," she said, "we felt that we should produce another one."

Surprisingly, Cattell adds, "most of our audience actually was Americans last year. We thought most of them wouldn't have a clue what this was about, and we were pleased the American audience understood it completely.

"It was an incredible response. We got everyone from kids to adults screaming at the stage. There was a lot of audience participation, and that was great because, really, that's what it's about."

"Snow White" will be the third production of the BNTA, which, Cattell says, was formed in April 2008, largely to produce "Cinderella."

The company, according to Cattell, grew out of a conversation between company co-founders Rob Winch, acrobatic captain at "Love," and Perkin, who runs automation at "Love."

"Rich and Rob were sitting in a pub one night and were reminiscing about pantomime and were, like, 'It would be great to do a pantomime" says Cattell, BNTA's artistic director and a freelance writer and director who splits her time between Las Vegas and New York. "They came to me -- I was working with them at the time -- and we started talking about it."

So, BNTA was created to produce last year's show. However, the response revealed that the new company could fill a niche in Southern Nevada's theater scene. Now, the nonprofit BNTA is, Cattell jokes, turning legit, with "our advisory board and all of that kind of fun stuff on the business side."

By the way: The group's name was chosen, first, as a bit of self-mocking pretentiousness and, second, as an in-joke.

The founders, Cattell explains, figured that, eventually, the name would be distilled down to its initials. And, she continues, "bint" is a "slangy word British people use for a stupid girl."

"When we were in the pub, it seemed absolutely hilarious at the time," Cattell adds.

Contact reporter John Przybys at jprzybys@ reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0280.