The following was written by Martin Barnes, in 2005, for his final pantomime as director and writer:
"Pantomimes in Polgooth were revived by Sylvia and I, together with Gill Harper making costumes and Jack and Joyce Uren marking all the props and painting the scenery. We had a young lady [Helen Treays] playing a guitar and a keyboard player [Andrew Clark] for the musical backing. Gill's daughter
, Cathy, was Principal boy and we paid for a script and paid royalties to Samuel French. The year was 1986. I had never written a word of dialogue at that point, but seeing the expense involved in buying scripts and paying royalties, I though I would give it a go. I have written 19 pantomimes for this village and directed all of them to some extent! We soon had the services of Bryan Thomas on piano and then Clavinola. He stayed until 1995. From then on we had the wonderful backing of Nigel Hitchens. Another 'new' helper was Jean Woodward, who took over scene painting from Jack and Joyce, who had served us so well. Jean stayed with us until 1997. Roger Thomas painted scenery for several pantomimes after this, helped by Joe Hicks and Don Nelson. We have had several choreographers in our twenty years. Anne Holland, Liz Bartlett, Jane Simons, Katherine Mannell, Jane Thomas, but for the last nine years we have been lucky enough to have the services of Denise Jackson. Jenny May has been with us for nearly every show, as prompt. The worst job of all! When Gill retired from making costumes, in 1994, Sylvia took over and was joined in 1998 by Jean Ryan and the two of them have been 'costuming' the shows between them ever since, Sylvia specialising in animals and Jean in humans! One stalwart who has been with Sylvia and I for all twenty years is Harold Trethewey, who lit our first show in February 1986 and walked back to St Austell on the last night through four inches of snow. Dawn and Dave Geeves took over the village shop in 1988 and David was soon recruited to take part in the village panto. He is our longest serving actor and was later joined by Joanna and Oliver, their two children. His wife, Dawn, has acted with us since 1998. We are indebted to Dave and Dawn and the staff of the Post Office for selling out tickets each year. The pantomime has given the Polgooth Village Institute several thousand pounds in its time here. What I am leading up to is that Sylvia and I are retiring from the pantomime scene in this village. We will both be nearly 67 when the curtain goes down on this year's show [Hazel and Denzel] and we feel that we have done our bit to keep live theatre going in the Institute. We have enjoyed our time with a lovely group of people but it is time for someone else to take over. Martin Barnes and Sylvia Ryland."
