Welcome to the heartwarming season of good cheer, reworked pop hits, terrible topical puns and wholesome gender confusion, this year all laid on with a trowel in the form of the Oxford Playhouse panto, Dick Whittington. High on traffic jokes, light on adherence to traditional story lines, the show is funny, sharp, and of course, touchingly optimistic about human nature.

This year’s theme offered something of a nostalgia-fest for my Manchester-raised nineties teen self (thanks, Playhouse team!). A quarter of a century on, my memory might be failing, but I swear we didn’t wear quite that many bucket hats, and our dance routines were definitely less polished. Otherwise 100% authentic, right down to the rodents. I don’t want to give too much detail about the plot because so many of the jokes are bound up in various parts of the premise, but suffice to say that Dick (sort of) Whittington travels to (sort of) London with a (sort of) cat to tackle an evil (sort of) villain. Oh, and boy bands, of course! The whole cast and the polished musicians create something really special together. Daisy Ann Fletcher shines in the lead role, with the warmth, exuberance and fine singing voice required by the occasion. Lucy Frederick’s Sarah Fitzwarren is a real show-stealer, costumes and comic timing both magnificent. Robin Hemmings is actually sensational as the baddie Liam Rattagher, camp but controlled, bringing an air of genuine menace that has you worrying, as you snigger guiltily at gag after ad hominem gag, that you might make him angry.

I’d started the day explaining the panto concept to friends from the US who’d not yet had the good fortune to experience this particular British tradition, tying myself in knots trying to unravel the joyful seasonal mix of saucy jokes and hopeful messaging that gives everyone an opportunity to let their hair down – absolutely failing to get the point across. For me it’s always the disconnect, the not quite appropriate, the questioning is-this-really-allowed, that brings the sense of freedom; anarchy carefully squeezed through a framework of tradition – Christmas catharsis.

Not to overthink these things, sometimes silliness is its own reward. The audience was certainly happy, singing along, booing and hissing and bearing all the usual indignities with unmistakable enjoyment, the adults fully as engaged as the kids. We’ll definitely be recommending the show, particularly to American first-timers. I’d love to know what they would make of it.