Canadian Stage's gender-flipped 'Robin Hood' is a bland panto that leaves you rooting for the rich

But Canadian Stage’s latest holiday panto, the painfully bland “Robin Hood: A Very Merry Family Musical,” somehow makes rooting for its titular folk hero an exceedingly difficult task.

So much so that by intermission, dear reader, I gave up trying. And by the time we reached the bows, some two hours into Matt Murray’s musical comedy, I found myself firmly on the side of the rich. 

Go ahead, boo me. 

But how can you not switch sides when “the rich” is portrayed here by the insanely talented Damien Atkins? Sporting a shaggy purple hairdo à la David Bowie’s Ziggy Stardust, and drawing out the vowels in his speech with an affectation recalling Catherine O’Hara’s Moira Rose from “Schitt’s Creek,” he runs away with the show. 

Atkins’s villainous Prince John resides in Casa Loma. (Because, of course he would.) He’s head of the e-commerce giant Glamazon, on a mission to stamp out all the small business across the kingdom. And while he’s at it, Prince John also plans to raze every tree from High Park to build a sprawling new development. 

Standing in his way, however, is the entrepreneurial Robin Hood (Julia Pulo), who runs a hoodie shop that’s appropriately named Robin’s Hoods. When the prince comes for her business, demanding a 90 per cent share of the profits for all the goods she sells on Glamazon, the ever-shrewd Robin decides to take matters into her own hands, trekking to Casa Loma to claim back what’s rightfully hers. 

Matt Murray’s adaptation, which plays fast and loose with the original folk tale, is more or less a Robin Hood origin story. But it never offers us a hero whom we can rally behind. 

Sure, with these holiday pantos, the juiciest character is almost always the villain. That’s usually followed closely behind by the pantomime dame — in this case Sparkle Bum, Robin’s babysitter-turned sidekick with a flair for saucy double entendres. (Daniel Williston, in drag, is an absolute hoot in the role.) 

But this show’s protagonist feels especially dimensionless. The musical begins right at the top with Robin singing the pop song “Best Day of My Life.” Murray, however, offers his audience little context as to why this is supposed to be Robin’s best day of her life. Neither do we really know who even is this version of the classic character. 

And while I understand Murray’s motivation for portraying Robin as a woman — the musical wants to show that women can be successful entrepreneurs, too — his message of female empowerment ultimately falls flat.

That’s because Robin is the most passive character in the entire musical. Instead (and somewhat ironically), it’s Murray’s gender-flipped Marion (played by Praneet Akilla) who’s firmly in the driver’s seat. 

Pulo, one of the peppiest and most talented young performers in Canadian musical theatre, is completely underutilized in this production. So too is panto regular Eddie Glen, who plays one of two mischievous thieves. (Julius Sermonia portrays the other.) 

Maybe all this could be forgiven if “Robin Hood” was funny. But Murray’s show rarely elicits anything except a few isolated titters. One Taylor Swift reference early on feels forced. Later, a sad one-liner about delays to the Eglinton Crosstown LRT sounds as if it was recycled from a previous holiday panto. 

It’s telling, in fact, that the biggest laugh at the performance I attended was for a joke delivered off-the-cuff by Glen, riffing on the viral 6-7 meme while interacting with a young audience member. (If you aren’t a member of Gen Alpha, look it up at your own peril.)  

Holiday pantos, though, should be a laugh riot. I fondly remember previous productions, from before Canadian Stage took over the tradition from Ross Petty, that left the Elgin Theatre shaking in its foundations, with humour that took no prisoners, poking fun at everything and anything from the previous year. 

For “Robin Hood,” a show that skewers the rich, you’d think that Murray would have many easy targets. Musk? Trump? Bezos? Surely the ongoing tariff war? Nope. Nada. In the end, it’s not that Murray misses the bullseye with his humour. Rather, he doesn’t even raise his bow and arrow. 

Director Mary Francis Moore’s production works best when it’s in motion, buoyed by choreography by Jennifer Mote that draws on everything from ‘70s disco to the latest TikTok dance craze. But these musical numbers are few and far between, especially in the first act. 

When the production isn’t in motion, its underwhelming physical designs become increasingly apparent. Brandon Kleiman’s set, relying heavily on pieces that are rolled on and off the stage, looks better suited for a production of “Shrek the Musical.” Meanwhile, Cameron Fraser’s distracting projection designs resemble those drab video games from the early aughts.

It goes without saying that Atkins towers high above this entire production. And when he’s on stage, flaunting his maniacal grin to the audience, you see glimmers of pantos past. But as for the rest of this “Robin Hood”: it’s a disappointing holiday dud.