Best Pantomime Scripts for Small Casts

There's a version of this question that goes: we've only got 15 people, can we still do a proper panto? The answer is yes, emphatically, and the reason directors worry about it is that they're thinking about the wrong thing.

A Small Cast doesn't mean a small show. What it means, in practice, is that every person on stage carries more weight, which, done right, produces tighter performances, more visible character relationships, and a show that moves. The groups that pull off small-cast panto well aren't the ones who treat it as a compromise. They're the ones who picked the right script for the numbers they had.

We have four scripts that work particularly well with nine principals or fewer: Aladdin, Beauty and the Beast, Hansel and Gretel, and Jack and the Beanstalk. They're different shows with different characters and different casting demands, but the thing they share is a structure that holds together with a compact company.

Here's what distinguishes each of them.

Aladdin, Drama Unlimited

Aladdin: eight principals, with a trick up its sleeve

Aladdin has eight clear principal roles: Aladdin, Wishy Washy, Widow Twankey, Princess Jasmine, Abanazar, the Genie of the Lamp, the Empress, and the Spirit of the Ring. That last one is worth noting: the Spirit of the Ring is written so that it can be played as a voice-only role so could easily be pre-recorded. Jean, the Genie of the Jeans, adds a ninth role who isn’t quite a principal but seems more than a supporting role too!

For a small cast, the genius of Aladdin is variety of world. You get a market, a laundrette, a palace, and a cave, each with a distinct look and feel, and a relatively short ensemble list behind the principals. The townsfolk, guards, and genies can be the same small group in different costumes. The show never feels thin because the lead roles are substantial and the comedy, particularly between Twankey and Wishy Washy, and between Aladdin and the Genie, carries its weight without needing crowd scenes.

Beauty and the Beast: seven principals with room for a few more

Beauty and the Beast has the fewest principals of any script in the catalogue: seven. Beauty, Dame Dotty Doolally, Brian, King Duncan, the Prince/Beast, Jeeves and Malignia, the wicked witch. The Beast and Prince Lucian can be played by the same actor or two different people, which is a useful decision to make based on your casting rather than a structural requirement either way.

What makes this script particularly well-suited to smaller groups is the castle. In Act Two, the castle's objects come to life as characters: Billy Bookcase, Cassio Clock, Chester Drawers, and Trey Table. These are four featured roles with their own moments and personality, ideal for ensemble members who want something more than background work but aren't ready for a principal. Your ensemble doubles as Act One townsfolk and Act Two enchanted furniture, which means the same people carry two very different theatrical worlds with a costume change between them.

Hansel and Gretel: eight principals, and the most flexible cast count in the catalogue

Hansel and Gretel is as close to a genuinely small-cast script as you'll find in panto, without sacrificing the structure that makes panto work. Eight principals: Hansel, Gretel, Dame Kitty Kipling, Greg Kipling, Griselda, Stinkworth, Ernest, and Edna. Behind them sit three named baker characters: Mr Wollyhood, Mrs Peith, and Miss Merry, (all named as spoonerisms of the first three GBBO judges!) who, in a small company, carry all the ensemble lines between them and also double as the recurring bakery Customer and as the Ghosts in the forest scenes. Three people doing the work of ensemble, featured characters, and atmosphere roles across two acts.

If you have more performers, those same roles expand naturally. The baking competition, the forest, and the Gingerbread House all absorb a larger ensemble without changing how the script works at its core. We know of one production that ran it with 45 performers including a large number of children, and another who only has a cast of ten! That breadth isn't a coincidence; it's how the script is built.

Jack and the Beanstalk, St Bernadette’s Parish Players

Jack and the Beanstalk: nine principals, a two-person cow, and one giant who can be invisible

Jack and the Beanstalk sits at nine principals: Jack, Simon, Dame Trot, King Harold, Princess Jill, Rowena Ratzi, Mrs Blunderbore, the Giant Blunderbore, and Fairy Haricot. Pat the Cow has been imagined as two actors in one costume, but can be effectively played by just one. The Giant can be played as a physical presence if you wish, but a voice from the wings with appropriate reverb and monstrous lighting effects mean you don’t need a very tall person, just a good solution.

The script moves across a village, a dairy, the Giant's castle above the clouds, and back again, which gives the ensemble three distinct costume worlds. Fairy Haricot summons the Bean-Sprites to help our heroes complete their mission, and they are the sort of role that work well for younger performers.

A note on ensemble

Small cast and small ensemble are not the same thing. Several of these scripts work brilliantly with a modest named cast and a generous ensemble: a school or youth group with 20 students and six or seven principals, for instance, is not a small cast in the way that phrase is usually understood. The scripts above are specifically well-suited to groups where the total company is compact, but all of them will happily absorb additional ensemble performers if you have them.

If your group has more principals to cast rather than more ensemble bodies, it may be worth looking at our Panto Scripts for Medium Casts, which offer 10–13 principal roles.

Request a free Perusal Script for any of the scripts above, and we'll send it over with no obligation.