Aring in the biggest and best pantos at theatres across the UK

things at the wrong moment and a bit of it fell down and hit me on the head. I said ‘The sky is falling in’. And then it did!

“Panto can be quite chaotic because you’ve got 20 people on stage at times.”

This Christmas, Joe will be making crowds giggle while playing Muddles the court jester in Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs at the Orchard Theatre in Dartford, Kent.

He reckons fans are in for a treat.

Joe said: “The special effects have improved so much in pantos over the past 10 years. This year we’ll have a flying motorbike, so I’ll be going out over the audience. “I think kids nowadays aren’t as easily impressed and you need to keep up with that.” Panto is one of the toughest jobs in showbiz with many productions being staged up to three times a day. Joe added: “It is intense but I enjoy that. People are paying the same amount of money for a show at the end of the run as they would at the beginning. And they deserve value for money. So you can’t be knackered at the end and not give as good a performance.” Joe also thinks the lavish stage shows offer something different to today’s screen-addicted youngsters. He said: “In this day, kids of seven have got mobile phones. So it’s important for the youngsters to get the experience of a theatre rather than watching something on a screen all the time. “They are actually interacting with live performers. “I first saw a pantomime when I was six and that memory has always stayed with me.”