Review: The Legend of Rooney's Ring at Liverpool's Royal Court ***1/2

It’s become part of Scouse folklore.

So it was perhaps inevitable the (tallish) tale of the time a teenage Coleen McLoughlin chucked her diamond and platinum engagement ring in a bush after a row with fiancé Wayne Rooney should find its way either on to page, stage or screen. The only surprise it it’s taken so long.

Unlike Vardy v Rooney: The Wagatha Christie Trial, fiction flirts only very briefly with fact in Helen Serafinowicz’s The Legend of Rooney’s Ring.

Instead, a single reported event serves as the starting point for an audacious and spiralling flight of fancy in what is billed as ‘the ultimate Scouse sword and sorcery’ story - which nods in the direction of fantasy adventure but actually lands more firmly in panto territory.

Serafinowicz’s pastiche references any number of sources, among them Tolkien’s Ring trilogy, Star Wars, Superman and He-Man (John May’s Wayne sports a strawberry blonde bowl cut hairdo and furry boots).

The action opens with a Star Wars-style rolling caption trailer with ‘voice of God’ narration as a gaggle of peasants, looking suspiciously as though they’ve been released from the Button House cellar, embark on a hunt for the legendary jewel of the title.

Keddy Sutton emerges, malleably shapeless, from the throng to become the storyteller-in-chief before re-emerging as Scouse Nana to timid titular hero Wayne, who wins the heart of the fair C’leen (Emma Grace Arends), then thanks to a dastardly piece of magic which makes him incomprehensibly irresistible to the laydeez, loses it again.

This being essentially panto, of course there has to be a baddie, and he arrives in the ill-fitting suit and orange-faced shape of the President of the United States (a naughtily keen impersonation by actor and impressionist Terry Mynott, making his Royal Court debut but who previously appeared in Serafinowicz’s small screen hit Motherland).

Above: Jess Smith, Lindzi Germain (Queen Colette) and Terry Mynott as Donald Trump. Top: John May as Wayne. Photos by Andrew AB Photography.

His Donald Trump, one third-Abanazer, one third-Gollum, one third-Emperor Palaptine, is determined to seize the one ring and 'bind them all'. And it's down to Wayne, Nana and the 'House of McLoughlin' to stop him.

It’s at this point that you might just suspect someone has been at the Royal Court's premium cheeseboard.

Because from being a relatively straightforward fantasy romp, The Legend of Rooney’s Ring quickly develops into one hell of a cheese dream – a scattergun explosion of Avenue Q-a-like puppets, Benjamin Button/Honey I Shrunk the Kids-style mishaps, Turkey teeth, Blind Date, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, terrible cracker jokes and a spot of Carry On belly dancing.

It's all cheerily delivered and goofily entertaining, although the ambitious everything-including-the-kitchen-sink approach also makes for a somewhat uneven two hours.

And while there's no doubt you get plenty of bang for your buck, not all of the gags and sub-plots which jostle for the audience's attention hit the mark, or at least don't have the full comedy pay off they should.

Above: The cast of The Legend of Rooney's Ring. Photo by Andrew AB Photography.

How much of this giddy extravaganza was in first-time playwright Serafinowicz’s original script, and how much was added in the rehearsal room is difficult to gauge.

Although with director Stephen Fletcher also listed as ‘dramaturg’ in the programme, and the Royal Court actors always up for having a hand in the action, I suspect a certain amount of embellishment took place during the page-to-stage process.

Royal Court regulars will definitely be au fait with some of the characterisations – Lindzi Germain and Liam Tobin, as C’leen’s parents King Tony and Queen Colette, continue the frisky double they formed in The Scouse Red Riding Hood last Christmas, while Keddy Sutton brings her trademark warmth and artless charm to the dual roles of narrator and Nana.

Meanwhile the whole cast throw themselves into the spirit of what is, essentially, a splash of summertime silliness.

The Court’s sets can often materialise as busily populated, double height interiors with characters disappearing through a door and appearing, through another, in a completely different scene.

Here, designer Olivia Du Monceau opts instead for a sparse, sound set-style staging, dominated by the revolve on which curls a graduated slope, set against a sweeping screen panorama (think War Horse) of vistas in luminous Lord of the Rings/Gone With the Wind hues and – in one scene where a lovelorn C’leen belts out a big ballad – a lovely milky way of stars.