Our story
How we started
Parish Players' was founded in 1956 after the Vicar of St Mary's at the time, Reverend Squire Heaton Renshaw, asked a member of the congregation, Charlie Flowers, to find a group of local youngsters who could "sing, sew and saw" and put on a Pantomime for the Parish.
This they managed with the first performance taking place in January 1957 and the rest, as they say, is history!
Throughout its history, Parish Players' has had many generations of the same families being involved, either on or off stage, with some occasions involving grandparents, parents, grandchildren, brother, sisters and cousins being involved in the same production!
Lasting friendships have been made over the years, some spanning many decades, and some evolving into romance and even marriage!
We are very lucky to have maintained a loyal membership throughout the years, one of our current members was in our very first performance and others, who still retain their memberships despite moving to various locations around the world, back and visit for rehearsals and performances when travel and time allows!
Members have gone on to have successful careers in the entertainment sector - read details of some here.
Our pantomimes
We have performed a pantomime in January every year since 1957, with the exception of 1965, 2021 and 2022. In 1965, the new hall was being built. There was no pantomime in 2021 due to Covid restrictions. The 2022 pantomime, Camelot was
postponed till May at the last minute when several members of the cast and crew tested positive for Covid.
All our pantomimes since the late 1960s have been ended with all the performers on stage singing “That’s the end of the Show” – the majority of the audience joining in as well! John Ashworth wrote the tune for “That’s the end of the Show” for a medical school review in 1967, the words having been written by others; it had a verse and a chorus which John used for a Parish Players’ panto (he thinks it was Cinderella in 1968 or Aladdin in 1969). He then combined the chorus of “That’s the end of the Show” with the chorus of “A hundred years from now”, which he had found on a 1928 dance band record, and thus the Parish Players’ panto “anthem” was born. Here we are performing it in the 2007 pantomime, Sleeping Beauty.
