Brian Beacom

THE PRODIGAL daughter is set to return.

After 13 long years in the wilderness (if you can refer to Aberdeen’s His Majesty’s Theatre as such) Elaine C. Smith is returning to her rightful panto home.

And already you can hear the swish of credit cards being processed through the King’s Theatre box office as fans of Scotland’s top panto star book their seats.

Elaine, who will star in Sleeping Beauty, explains why she’s glad to be back in her home town.

“I was lonely,” she says of her stint in the North East.

“Don’t get me wrong, the audiences were wonderful.

“I stayed in a lovely hotel in the city, and the production values in the panto were fantastic.

“But even on my day off there was a three hour drive to get home. I really think the loneliness was getting to me.”

She adds, smiling; “I’ve got my granddaughter, (three year-old Stella) who I don’t like to be apart from.

“And I’m fifty-eight now. I’m way past the age where I could go out every night after the show, clubbing with the 19 year-old dancers.”

Elaine could have gone back to the King’s in Glasgow at any time in recent years.

But she felt the panto wasn’t being run the way it could have been.

“I didn’t want to go back to the King’s with the scripts they were using in recent years, and with the production values being what they were.

“I liked the way it worked in Aberdeen. For example, we were looking at the scripts for the Christmas ahead in February. Every attention was given to detail, to the words, to the songs, the sketches.

“And we were always doing updated topical gags and sketches, such as me appearing on stage last time as Donald Trump.”

But this week, Elaine changed her mind. Why? The panto overlords who previously ran the King’s Theatre’s festive shows, First Family Entertainment exited Stage Left.

And a Good Fairy arrived from the wings in the form of national panto boss Michael Harrison, who runs Qdos Entertainment, the world’s largest panto producers.

Michael Harrison is the man responsible for the likes of His Majesty’s and the Clyde Auditorium.

“It’s great to be still working for Michael but now in Glasgow,” says Elaine.

“And we are already on the ball of this year. I’ve been looking at the script for Christmas which will be written by Alan McHugh, who is the panto writer at Aberdeen and it will be great.”

Elaine adds; “It’s all about pre-planning. I know the routines I’ll be doing already. And with Michael Harrison in control this will make a massive difference to the King’s panto.”

Elaine C. Smith is in many ways a different person from the lady who walked away from the King’s thirteen years ago.

“At the time I didn’t want to be known as a Glasgow panto star,” she admits.

“I looked at Gerard Kelly appearing there every year and I felt the Christmas panto sort of defined him. I didn’t want to be in the same situation.

“I wanted to be known outside of Glasgow. I wanted to do other things.”

Elaine felt she had something to prove to theatre and television producers. But in recent years, most of the boxes have now been ticked.

She has gone on to star in her one-woman shows, front her own STV travelogue series Burdz Eye View and currently stars in BBC comedy Two Doors Down (which returns again later in the year and with a Christmas special).

Meantime, she has wallowed in the chance to appear in arts theatre venues in challenging plays, from Oran Mor to the Tron. And she’s starred in successful touring productions of the Susan Boyle musical I Dreamed A Dream and Annie, playing Miss Hannigan.

Along the way she picked up the Royal Television Society Screen Award for On Screen Television Personality of the Year.

And next year, Elaine confirms the return of Rab C. Nesbitt is still very much on the slates for an appearance the SSE Hydro.

“Yes, I don’t have to prove myself to anyone, or to myself,” says the mum of two daughters, smiling.

“And now I’m really happy to be seen as someone who stars in panto.”

Yet, while the return to the King’s will offer a delight in that she can return to her own bed in Glasgow’s south side each night, and she can see little Stella every day, the return will be a little bitter sweet.

“The last time I was at the King’s panto my mum was in the audience,” she says in soft voice of Stella, who passed away in 2005.

“And I will miss Kelly (co-star Gerard Kelly). The King’s is so evoking of him.”

Elaine breaks into a smile at the memory of her very funny pal.

“He would almost feint if I ad-libbed,” she recalls. “He was too much of an actor to deal with me making stuff up and he would corpse.”

Elaine says there is a lovely symmetry in coming back to the King’s with Sleeping Beauty.

“Sleeping Beauty was the first panto I did with Michael Harrison directing, twenty years ago.”

She adds, smiling; “It will be magical.”

But then the confidence dips a little, and a hint of fragility, and genuine modesty emerges.

“I just hope that in all the years away I’ve been missed,” she says, with a hopeful smile.

• Sleeping Beauty, the King’s Theatre, December 2 – January 8.