principal boy

British  

noun

1. the leading male role in a pantomime, played by a woman

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Example Sentences

A young woman plays the “principal boy.”

From New York Times

Tall and elegant in a herringbone jacket and shiny black knee boots, she looks like a cross between the headteacher of a private girls’ school and the principal boy in the school pantomime.

From The Guardian

According to pantomime historian Professor Jeffrey Richards, “the reason for Principal Boy being female was entirely due to Victorian randiness. It gave the fathers in the stalls a chance to ogle a lovely girl with a wasp waist and shapely thighs.”

From Newsweek

Principal boy of a panto meets Pocahontas imagined by Robert Louis Stevenson.

From The Guardian

Flimsy non-speaking role as adjunct to principal boy?

From The Guardian