After over 10 years of performing together, Aaron Malkin and Alastair Knowles are returning to Victoria with their annual touring Christmas pantomime O Christmas Tea: A British Comedy. Acting under the stage names James and Jamesy, the duo has performed five different plays (Malkin plays James; Knowles plays Jamesy); Christmas, however, is a particularly special time for them.
“Each of our shows has a theme, and our Christmas show has the theme of imagination,” says Malkin. “The resistance to and the willingness to embrace imagination. And Christmas, for us, is filled with that opportunity. It’s a time of the year when adults get to play magic, whether it’s Elf on the Shelf, or Santa for their kids.”
The two originally met in Vancouver when performing in a play together.
“We had a wonderful experience with that. And we continued to want to work together and happened upon these James and Jamesy characters,” says Malkin.
Knowles adds that the depth of their friendship was a huge part of the creation of the characters.
“This relationship is great on so many different fronts,” he says. “I feel challenged and inspired and supported.”
Malkin says they decided to take their James and Jamesy act and share it with a wider audience, to great success.
“We put it in a cabaret show, and the audience response was unlike anything we’d ever experienced… And so we expanded an eight-minute skit into a full show tour that did very well,” he says. “It sold out in every city it went to.”
But they hadn’t always planned on being performers. Knowles had an entirely different career path in mind until he discovered all that acting brought to his life.
“I studied business at UBC. So I did a bit of a commerce degree. And then I started studying clown because I thought I might learn more about myself and become a more expressive human. It was in the process of studying clown that I tapped into a sense of play that I felt rejuvenated me. So because I felt that value in embracing this world of play, I think that motivated me to create contexts where that can happen for the broader population. And for us, it’s through theatre.”
When they come on the stage, playfulness and expressiveness are inevitable, and the love in James and Jamesy’s friendship is part of what makes that on-stage chemistry so easy. The love is so palpable it once brought concern to one potential attendee.
“We got an email from an audience member. They were like, I want to attend the show, but I’m concerned that there might be gay content in the show,” says Knowles with a laugh.
While the connection isn’t necessarily romantic, Knowles isn’t bothered by the speculation.
“There is a love between them,” he says. “Interpret however you feel like interpreting that love, but the love between them is clear and explicitly stated.”
Knowles says that the most heartwarming part of their decade-long journey is the people who have made the show part of their own traditions. Malkin agrees, adding that the feeling they can offer people through the performance is what brings him back to the stage time and time again.
“Something that some audience members have shared after their experience in the show that sticks with me is that through the experience of the show, they discover a new version of themselves,” he says, “which comes with an elation of their spirit or their joy and I think it’s largely connected with the opportunities that audience members have to participate in the creation of the show. And that makes me very happy.”
O Christmas Tea: A British Comedy
7:30 pm Tuesday, November 14
3 pm and 7:30 pm Wednesday, November 15
Various prices, Mary Winspear Centre
3 pm and 7:30 pm Sunday, November 19
Various prices, Royal Theatre
ochristmastea.com