Phil Cluskey could probably recite every line of the Alhambra pantomime in his sleep.

As a sound operator at the Bradford theatre, he watches every performance of the panto from the sound desk at the back of the stalls – and he has seen every single performance of every pantomime Billy Pearce has starred in, over the last seven years. That’s more than 550 shows!

Mr Cluskey is now working on Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, which draws to a close on Sunday, February 6. It is the latest running professional pantomime in the country, continuing an Alhambra tradition of long-running shows.

This year’s panto was the 12th for Yorkshire funnyman Billy Pearce, a former pupil of Benton Park School in Rawdon, and for the past seven years he has starred in consecutive Alhambra pantos. It has already been announced that he will star in the 2011/2012 production, Robin Hood. The full set for Snow White filled four articulated lorries to bring it to the Alhambra. Three with scenery and one with electrical equipment.

A total of 1,800 man hours were used to build the set and rig the electrics, and by the end of the panto’s run a total of 400 pyrotechnics will have been used for the 77 performances.

It takes 16 backstage crew to run each performance. A total of 45 flying bars are used on stage and the scenery includes special effects, lights and speakers. One kilo of liquid CO2 is used per performance for the dry ice effects, and four kilometres of cabling is used.

Three projectors beam 3D images eight metres across the stage on to a giant screen, and there is a total of 3,000 3D glasses for audiences to wear.