'Panto helped me get into acting - now it's my 1,000th turn as a dame'

It was a gag about a packet of crisps in a Southend pantomime that inspired seven-year-old Damian Williams to get into showbusiness.

Now, after 252 wigs, 200 pairs of sparkly Doc Marten boots and thousands of jokes, 54-year-old Williams is celebrating his 1,000th turn as the resident dame at Sheffield's Lyceum Theatre.

Speaking to the BBC in his dressing room as he gets ready to perform in this year's show, Aladdin, he praises panto for giving a "working class lad from Essex" his big break.

Williams did not go to a prestigious drama school.

Instead, he joined a repertory theatre company where he learned to act from "just doing plays and watching other actors".

But he says it was a visit to see a pantomime of Robinson Crusoe with his nan in 1978 that started it all.

At the performance, the dame asked the audience if there was anybody by the name of Smith in the crowd - then chucked a bag of Smiths crisps at them.

"Everyone laughed and it suddenly clicked in my head - and I thought that's good," says Williams.

"I remember that and I think that's where it all started for me really - panto was the first thing I saw."

Williams lives in Southend, Essex, with his wife Barbie but relocates to Sheffield every year for panto season.

He first played the role of dame aged just 27.

The dame is traditionally played by older men who have worked their way up through the ranks.

Alongside the celebrity casting, which changes each year, the dame is one of the stars of the show.

Williams also features in CBeebies' Andy and the Band and has plenty of experience playing more serious roles, so when asked what makes him keep coming back to the camp, slapstick world of panto, he says: "To start with, it was a job. But I loved it.

"For years I played the villain, then it's one of those things where you just shift on to different parts.

"For playing the dame, you need the experience and here in Sheffield in particular, which is very dame-strong, it's the ultimate role.

"You involve the audience so much with the show," he adds.

According to Williams, the dame is a "goodie," a mother figure and "almost like a clown".

The costumes are elaborate and he changes his outfit 14 times during a show - basically every time he comes back on stage.

"I love the fact that panto is sometimes the first time that a person has been to the theatre and even after a thousand times, it never gets boring," Williams says.

And it is a quaintly British phenomenon, he adds.

"Only we do it well. Other countries have tried and it doesn't work, it just wouldn't work in America would it?

"They just don't get it, it would just be weird.

"The men play the women and the women play men and and you shout at the audience and they shout back at you."

Pantomime dates back to the late 18th Century in England and was an early form of participatory theatre in London.

In its heyday in Victorian London, shows could last up to five hours, according to the Victoria and Albert Museum.

In more recent years, pantomime has become an important element of a theatre's offering - and its finances.

More than 500,000 people from across Yorkshire went to see a pantomime last year and 16 regional theatres said pantos brought in between 9% and 45% of their annual income in 2024.

Darren Henley, chief executive of Arts Council England, says pantomimes are the "absolute bedrock" that regional theatre across across the country are built upon.

"It's a couple of hours where you can lose yourself. It's traditional, it's modern, it's innovative," he adds.

Sheffield Theatres also predicted it would see more than 50,000 visitors this season.

Williams says the trend for pantomime keeps growing, despite it "taking a bit of a dive in the 90s," when he says it went a bit "naff".

It evolves, he says, because the songs, jokes and scripts are modern and take into account language and references that also need to change with the times.

But how did this proud "Essex boy" and panto dame end up performing in Sheffield for the past 18 years?

He was initially offered a gig in Canterbury but the resident dame there was a "big guy like me" so he thought it might be too much.

Sheffield was the next offer - and Williams only thought he would be up north for a year.

"But I love it here", he says.

"The city's great, the people are great and the atmosphere over Christmas in Sheffield is lovely - and they love their panto.

"There's a buzz here that you don't get anywhere else because they're so proud of Sheffield.

"It's a very social city and you can feel that anywhere you go."

Williams says he has no plans to leave Sheffield for now and after a short break, he will go straight into preparing for next year's role in Cinderella.

But, as his first dame role was in Aladdin, the fact that his 1,000th performance will be in the same show is extra meaningful.

"In fact I'm going to get a tattoo this year, of a little Aladdin's lamp."

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