There are school pantomimes, and there are school pantomimes. And this has to be the best I've ever seen.

Our very own Mr Holland not only wrote the theme tune and sang the theme tune... he wrote the whole pantomine, directed it and starred in it. And a very good job he did - as did the other teachers and pupils. I've never seen such a fantastic school production.

A twist on the traditional tale, Ali Baba and the forty Steves was a fast-paced adaptation set in the Middle East. Poor wood cutter Ali (Ben Barraclough) and his widowed mother Sally (Bill Holland) are struggling to make ends meet. To make things worse, their village is plagued by a gang of forty robbers all called Steve and led by a ruthless and evil Robber King (Dave Creighton).

Ali Baba falls in love at first sight - "I've never felt like this before" - with a beautiful slave girl, Polly (Clare Creighton) - but she belongs to his wealthy brother, David (Jack Gearing) and his selfish (and not great singer), Victoria (Gemma Dunstall, who sang beautifully). How can Ali save the village from ruin and rescue Polly from a life in bondage? Thank Christmas for fairy godmothers! (Especially those played so well by Di Critchlow-Skinner).

Sergeant Pepper and PC World (gerrit?) did an excellent, if not corny job of filling time between scene changes - "And remember, don't have nightmares!" - whilst Colin, the only member of the gang of thieves not to be called Steve, completed his crossword managing to resist any clues about overworked postmen.

Dr Watt (Rory Binks) and his receptionist Cindi (Samantha Ferdinand) coped expertly with deaf old Mrs Brown, whose poor husband was almost at the wrong end of chisel and mistreated with vinegar and brown paper, but sadly they had no idea where David was bleedin' from.

The belly-dancing troupe of slave girls performed a superb rendition of Dream which could easily have been mistaken for a Girls Aloud cover.

Chaos reigned towards the end as the thieves, Ali et al and the policemen all hid in wait for the secret signal of two hoots of an owl, unexpectedly uttered by Farmer Potato (William Holmes) as he demonstrated his bird impressions. But thankfully good triumphed over evil - and Ali & Polly got married. "At last! Our land is free of the Robber King and his nasty band".

Same time next year? I hope so.

"Hit it, Miss Broomfield!