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Help me put 50 kids on stage

 
 
wembley can change in 28 days
09:52 / 31.01.03
Okay, I've got 53 kids, 7-11 year-olds, and I have to direct them in a show in a few months. I need to pick a story and pick it fast, and I want to be able to give lots of stage time to as many kids as possible.

Limitations: if the story is usually a musical (like oliver twist) when staged, it should be able to hold up without the music. i haven't got real musicians, great costume staff, etc. plus they're slobbering evil alien children from hell who won't shut up on mondays...

Suggested to me already: Alice in Wonderland. The Hobbit. Peter Pan. Oliver Twist. The Wizard of Oz. Charlie and the chocolate factory. My twisted idea: do a kids' version of Antigone.
 
 
STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK
10:23 / 31.01.03
Ali Baba and the 40 Thieves. It's a great story, and you've already got 41 cast members covered using the title alone. (Not all of whom need speaking roles, but can still impress their parents by being in the title.)
 
 
deja_vroom
10:38 / 31.01.03
Make an extended version of Gorey's "Gashlycrumb Tinies" and kill them all on the stage. Just kiddaaaaeeennnng! Here, have a balloon.
 
 
Jack Fear
12:44 / 31.01.03
The 47 Ronin.
 
 
grant
13:35 / 31.01.03
Oooo! Chushingura!

A bunch of kids with swords!!!

Our 8 year old at home (barely domesticated) loves the hell out of "Oliver." He's also doing some Greek myths at school (paper masks - Perseus slaying Medusa).

The myth of Orpheus might be a fun one. Or... damn, who was it who went to Hades and fed the shade of Tiresias blood so he could prophesy? Was that Ulysses? Anything with lots of kids being dead people - especially if they talked like a Greek chorus, in turn. That'd rock.
 
 
Tryphena Absent
14:28 / 31.01.03
Do part of the The Odyssey- that way you can have loads of 7 to 9 year olds running around with swords and foil armour, a semi quiet kid as narrator and some loud brash child as Odysseus and just imagine the baddies!
 
 
Whisky Priestess
14:32 / 31.01.03
Fanny Hill. It has a cast of thousands.
 
 
that
18:58 / 31.01.03
Thanks to Tony Robinson and his books, I always think of Odysseus as the quiet, cunning type...can't remember what he's like in the Homer version, but the Tony Robinson version is lots of fun, I read it when I was a kiddie and greatly enjoyed it. If you do a Greek myth type thing you might want to check 'em out...
 
 
jeff
15:57 / 01.02.03
The Vagina Monologues.
 
 
Persephone
17:19 / 01.02.03
I vote for the Odyssey! Imagine the costumes for Scylla and Charybdis! Men turning into pigs --you can make papier mache pig noses with elastic bands to keep 'em on...
 
 
Persephone
17:23 / 01.02.03
...see, I would do Charybdis with a bunch of kids wearing water-colored capes. We're doing this in Poseidon, it's actually pretty effective. The kids would be bunched together in a circle, and they would swirl around with their arms out, trying to grab Odysseus!
 
 
wembley can change in 28 days
19:12 / 01.02.03
Persephone, you're starting to convince me...

Of course, this would mean heckloads of reading for me over the next couple of weeks, but maybe it's a good idea. I was also planning on having the kids doing music when they're not onstage - simple drumming or chanting or songs. The Odyssey would really be a great choice for that. The limiting factor here will be costumes, I think, unless they can be made by the kids. Ooh, I'm starting to get excited about the project now...

I'm also tempted to get all Oliver on them and expose them as the good-for-not-much ragamuffins they are.
 
 
Persephone
11:38 / 03.02.03
Have you decided, wembley? I got inspired and read over the Odyssey again... one hates to do violence to Homer, but I believe that you will have to cut pretty aggressively. The best part for kids, I think, is the part that Odysseus tells to the Phaiakians. But that leaves out his homecoming, which is sort of important...

But anyway, it would be *great* if you could post or blog the whole experience --whether it's the Odyssey or Oliver-- and show how the whole thing comes together. As if you won't have enough to do!

P.S. You can use a lot of hand-held masks on sticks, like for the pigs. Kids can make those, they're easier than papier mache.
 
 
wembley can change in 28 days
14:24 / 03.02.03
Persephone, can I put you on the payroll? You're rocking my socks off. And today was the hard group (grades 1 and 2) - I had to send a kid out into the hall for being an absolute twit for 45 minutes straight. Felt bad, but got a lot more done after her removal. Of course, then she refused to participate and is probably going to tell her mother that I'm an evil bitch. Oh well.

It's the Odyssey. The kids (and most of the parents, I'm sure) won't know how much damage poor Homer will suffer at our hands, but it's the storytelling I'm after. And the masks!
 
 
grant
18:53 / 03.02.03
I can tell you from a study sample of one (1) that kids like wearing togas.
 
 
Jack Fear
19:21 / 03.02.03
Toga = Roman.

Greeks wore chitons.
 
 
grant
20:45 / 03.02.03
Tell that to the third grade teachers in West Palm....
 
 
Persephone
23:57 / 03.02.03
*insanely happy*

Togas/chitons would be great. They're easy and they're fun & they'll make a good stage picture --more emphasis on the masks. If you do the part where Odysseus's men slay the sacred cattle, then there's cow masks too.

can I put you on the payroll?

What sort of words have escaped your teeth's barrier? Getting paid to do theater??
 
 
wembley can change in 28 days
07:24 / 04.02.03
That's right, baby! I'm making money doing what I love (with brats I'd love to ship to antarctica)!

And I'm pretty sure there won't be any togas in this version. I'm going to find a kid who likes hip-hop to do the opening "give me words, mister muse" speech, and we're going to go from there...
 
 
The Strobe
08:56 / 04.02.03
Hmn. No togas, probably good idea... but masks might still work and work as a nice hang-over of tradition. At least for some characters, or something. It's an idea.
 
 
Whisky Priestess
12:33 / 04.02.03
Make them perform it naked and invite parents to take photos ... I'm not helping, am I?

Seriously though - it sounds good. Another old favourite is apparently Noyes' Fludde (Britten?) which means all the kids can pretend to be animals and sing.
 
 
wembley can change in 28 days
12:48 / 04.02.03
Paleface: there will definitely be masks. I'm planning on lots of them. Plus I figure if the kids make some of the masks, it will keep them from fighting for stretches of five minutes or maybe even longer.

I just had the tuesday group - what a difference a day makes! These kids are perfect angels (and half of them acrobats to boot) compared with the monday demons. Plus I got to teach them "Alice the Camel," so even I had lots of fun. The worst thing is I'm having trouble remembering all of their names, because Finnish names for me go in one ear and out the other. Pekka? Sini? Juha? I've got a girl named Kamomilla, an Iikka, Eetu, Atte and Ekku, and god help you if you can't keep Timo, Teemu and Tommi straight.
 
 
Persephone
01:12 / 05.02.03
I'm going to find a kid who likes hip-hop to do the opening "give me words, mister muse" speech, and we're going to go from there...

Frabjous. It's going to be great.
 
  
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