THIS is Berwick Kaler’s fifth Aladdin in his 35-year damehood at York Theatre Royal.

The last came in 2005, and for all his self-mockery that he dishes up the “same old rubbish” each winter, the truth is very different.

Dame Berwick moves with the times, his shows becoming ever more camp, while still tipping his hat to pantomime convention with a pretty transformation scene, the song-sheet, one burst of “Behind You” and a retro “False alarm” gag as old as his stalwart stooge Martin Barrass’s new character, Wisehopper, the oldest man in China.

Barrass was a tad under-used in David Leonard’s pomp as the bestest, baddest villain in pantoland, but with Leonard gone south to first Matilda in London and now Chicago in Leicester, Barrass has become vital as more than Kaler’s punchbag.

Wisehopper is a riff on Barrass’s accident-prone Alfie in the West End run of One Man, Two Guvnors in 2012 and 2013, borrowing his shaking finger, his painfully slow movement and brilliantly timed physical slapstick.

Kaler nevertheless gives him individuality through daft Chinese proverbs and sets Barrass a series of races against time to swap between Chinese sage and his traditional role as the dame’s son, Mankee Twankey, twin of Aladdin.

Aladdin was played by golden gal Suzy Cooper in only her second break from principal girl mode in 2005 but Dame Berwick spotted something in dancer Al Braatz’ incongruous Canadian accent last year, and here promotes the North American lad to Aladdin, rising from camp cameo to cartoonesque all-American hero without shedding the camp.

Suzy C has reverted to sending herself up as a Empress mumsy’s darling teenage daughter in a tantrum, her Princess Peke-A-Boo carrying plenty of Michelle Blair’s choreographic numbers, to go one wonderful innovation as a squeaky puppet with a human head.

This show puts the emphasis on the lad in Aladdin, Sian Howard’s Empress occupying a back seat, but the boy dancers Harry Hughes (from Pocklington, incidentally), Jake Lindsay and James Tomlinson each taking the plunge in the water slapstick. Who will be next to follow Al Braatz in following (the absent) Vincent Gray and AJ Powell’s luvverly Brummie in rising from the ensemble?

Powell takes an ever more prominent role in the Theatre Royal panto, this time as the Genie of the Bling with more costume changes than a Cher show and a bagful of lovable bold characterisations. As last year, his dance duet with Jonathan Race’s no-nonsense villain, Abanazar, is a gem.

Praise too for the ever wonderful designs of Phil R Daniels and Charles Cusick Smith and the deliberately rough-cut film work of Christopher Spence, and welcome to new musical director Elliot Styche, who settles in most impressively.

What of veteran Dame Berwick? He still pulls the strings, has the last word, bonds amusingly with a snake and ad-libs with wide-eyed relish, but you sense his joy now lies as much in seeing others blossom around him. That blossoming, it must be said, is heading in a pink direction, Kaler demanding the curtain should come down after one particularly saucy gag, asking if York is ready for it.

Bang on the topical money as ever, he even accommodates the 2013 resurgence of gay icon David Bowie in Hughe’s Gene Genie.

It may leave the women’s roles out on a limb, but the audience is loving the high camp, and Kaler and co-director Damian Cruden will no doubt push it still further in future.

Aladdin And The Twankeys, York Theatre Royal, until February 1 2014. Box office: 01904 623568 or at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk