THE 70th annual LTM National Pantomime still carries with it important cultural lessons appealing to the entire family, from the young to the old, as it draws on day-to-day life from various aspects of Jamaican life.

Blinga Linga, now showing at the Little Theatre in Kingston, is written by Barbara Gloudon and directed by Robert ‘Bobby’ Clarke. It captures various aspects of the present day Jamaican society, all wrapped up in humour.

Blinga Linga is about a community ruled by a don in the form of Don Dadda played by Ray Jarrett, who has been with the Pantomime Company since 2002. He is the richest man in Nuff-Nuff Whatta Gwaan. Don Dadda who loves money, gets his wealth from rent collected from persons living in So-So Whatta Gwaan and from business conducted in the Blinga Linga mall named after his only daughter. Don Dadda decides to increase the rent of his tenants, causing a demonstration by members in the community, and the don threatens to have the homes bulldozed and replaced by a gated community and condos.

While Blinga Linga, played by Jacqueline Higgins, enjoys her life of wealth, she is consumed by loneliness and desires to marry. She brings out the technological aspect of our modern day society where she pleads for persons to text her on her cellphone.

For years, the Pantomime has reflected aspects of Jamaican society and Bling Linga is no different. This year it included the no-show by a hurricane, causing many to argue that they spent all their money buying up food items and making preparations for a hurricane that did not strike. There were street dances featuring the male dance crews, young persons disobeying their guardians, sculling school and opting instead to wipe windscreens to make money despite the hard work put in by their grandmother . We also saw a divide between the rich and the poor — sounds familiar? — perhaps yes, but all worked in the grand scheme of the panto.

One of the scenes that captured the audience was the physical fight by two old men in So-So Whatta Gwaan who were otherwise best friends, Count Calabash (Cadine Hall) who likes to boast of how highly educated he was and Lawda Massi (Kevin Halstead). These two young actors handles their roles particularly well and truly brought their characters to life.

The National Pantomime is generally characterised by music, movement and colour and this year’s set was very well thought through with the minutest of details taken into consideration — even the very potholes in the roads (painted onto the backdrop).

Crowd interaction was also very good, with questions being put to the audience from time to time and the audience invited to participate.

Wardrobe, done by Anya Gloudon-Nelson, though good, could have been better in some areas: the richest man in Nuff-Nuff Whatta Gwaan could have been more elegantly dressed, especially in his first few appearances. Regular shirt and pants placed him on the same level as other members in the community, with even Count Calabash being more elegantly and ‘richly’ dressed than he was. Blinga Linga’s costume was, however, quite fitting and one could tell she was rich. Don Dadda’s personal assistant Shanice (Toni-Ann Fraser) could have been more appropriately dressed, especially since Miss T, her aunt, was a dressmaker. Her footwear — flip-flops — was inappropriate for someone with her job and position.

It would have had more effect if the two dancers were dressed in tight-fitting pants (and maybe even bleached out faces) to depict the trend of our male dancers today.

While the production in itself was good it was anti-climactic. It failed to do what was expected, which was to see Dan Dadda punished for his wrongdoing.

We were also unable to see where, after a declaration by the children’s grandmother that ‘who can’t hear must feel’, the two children did not pay any penalty for sculling school or stopping off in the afternoons to wipe windscreens. Neither was any mention made of what they did with the money earned from this child labour.

However, one was able to draw from the final song that ‘what happen in a day never happen in a year,’ giving the feeling that all ended well.

Overall, the 70th Little Theatre Movement’s National Pantomime Blinga Linga is still going strong, quite entertaining, full of humour and worth a visit with the family.