Theatre

As well as directing Aladdin, he takes the role of Widow Twankey, alongside Chris Till as the boy with the lamp and Clive Mantle as the evil Abanazar.

We caught up with him at the panto's press launch, a few months before rehearsals began, where he was meeting up with some of the cast for the first time.

"Jon Monie I know, he's an old pal and good pantomime maniac, well known and much loved by the people of Bath, " Chris told the BBC Bristol and Bath website.

"Clive Mantle is new to this genre and he's looking forward to it. There's slight apprehension I think, but we'll look after him.

"He's big, he's a big tall boy! We have a little 'amores' during the show. It's good to have a big tall Abanazar and a little short Widow Twankey - I may have to climb on the washing machine or something!"

After a traditional start at drama school, the Bridgwater-born boy went into rep, which culminated in two years with the Old Vic Theatre Company at the Theatre Royal in Bristol.

"Then they closed the theatre for refurbishment, to rebuild it. I was on stage the night they closed it, " he said, a situation which has a familiar ring to theatre goers currently worrying about the Old Vic's future.

Moscow State Circus

He then decided to go to France to study mime and from there moved to Czechoslovakia to study and on to the Moscow State Circus.

"I didn't know where it was all going," said Chris. But where it did end was with his own shows. During the mid 1970s Chris built himself a large TV profile, with his show Hey Look That's Me.

"The producer said one day 'we need a few more characters in it why don't you play a super hero a naughty boy and maybe your secretary'," said Chris.

"As a result of that I invented a character called Lil who became more important than I was in the programme.

"I got to know the character so well, a bit like, though I would never dare to equate myself with Barry Humphreys, that sort of extraordinary belief you have in Dame Edna Everage, you can almost believe it's a separate person."

He's now widely regarded as one of the country's foremost 'dames' and says that while the characters may look similar, they are different.

"When I come to do the panto dame I think what I try to do is try and bring an actor to work rather than a drag act, " he said.

"Arthur Lucan played this woman called Old Mother Riley who had a daughter Kitty, he's the nearest to what I always thought panto dames should be, a totally believable character, always wringing his arms, she was always busy and ran a laundry like Widow Twankey does.

"Widow Twankey is a woman with mangled thoughts, she's all over the place, she's lost her husband and has her sons Aladdin and Wishee Washee to bring up. 'It's a hard life for a dame'."

Chris has been taking to the seasonal stage in panto since 1966 when he walked the boards at the Salisbury Playhouse with Stephanie Cole.

"It's the hardest work you'll ever do in the theatre, playing a dame, ask Ian McKellen, he played a great Widow Twankey the last two years in London, " he explained.

"It's one of those roles that is extraordinarily demanding - you're changing costumes and the whole thing about performance is that you are live outside your own body energy.

"Panto is performance energy plus, you do things physically, you push yourself a little further and of course the older you get the more you pay for it later, you get more tired or things hurt a bit."

Bristol Old Vic

But this year's pantomime is not the only thing paining Chris at the moment, he says he is "hugely worried" about the state of theatre in Bristol and the closing for refurbishment of one of the city's most prestigious venues, the Old Vic, and is asking local people to help save it.

"It is vastly important that the people of Bristol and the surrounding areas who have been loyal supporters of this theatre for many, many years must make their voices heard, he said.

"What we want to happen is not just the refurbishment of the theatre, which the appeal is going out for and of course we must have, the most important thing is that we want the reinstatement of the Bristol Old Vic Theatre Company.

"If you remember, 2008 was going to be Bristol as the City of Culture and can you imagine a City of Culture without the Theatre Royal and the Old Vic Theatre Company?

"We are desperately in need of every support from anybody who has ever had anything to do with the Bristol Old Vic, that they realise that, yes, we want to have the refurbishment, it's essential to get licensed, but we must ensure the survival of the Bristol Old Vic Theatre Company, " said Chris.

"I had nine years there, writing the panto and playing the dame, I've known Bristol since 1968 and I think the city would be bereft without it, it's just so important. It should be the jewel in the crown not the thorn in the side and that is hugely important."

The future of Bristol's Old Vic remains uncertain but in Bath the Theatre Royal has had one of its best ever years for advance bookings for its autumn season - which should be good news for this year's panto.

You can catch Aladdin, starring Chris Harris, Clive Mantle, Chris Tell and Jon Monie from 13 December 2007 to 20 January 2008.