They'll be playing Dingle Bells at the Bradford Alhambra this Christmas - Big Mandy is the city's panto star.

The Bradford theatre announced today that the larger-than-life star of TV's Emmerdale will head the cast of a spectacular Millennium production of the family favourite Dick Whittington. It will be the biggest stage role yet for Lancashire actress Lisa Riley, who plays Mandy and also hosts Granada TV's You've Been Framed.

Children's TV favourites The Chuckle Brothers - Paul and Barry Chuckle - will appear alongside her.

The producers of last year's hit panto, Peter Pan, have been retained for Bradford's new show, traditionally one of the biggest in Britain.

Tickets go on public sale on Thursday, May 13, and the Alhambra is braced for an early rush, especially as prices have been held to last year's levels. The show will run from December 17 to February 5, 2000.

Lisa Riley joins a panto roll call in Bradford that includes virtually every great name in showbusiness this century - Les Dawson and Ken Dodd among them. Lisa will play the Fairy, with Scarborough comic Tony Peers as Dame and the Chuckle Brothers as Captain and First Mate. She will come to Bradford next month to meet theatre staff and group booking agents.

A theatre spokesman said: "The show will have Bradford chuckling into the Millennium."

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