Outdoor Theater Fest diary: Lear, Pinocchio and The Three Musketeers

Outdoor Theater Fest diary, Saturday, July 14, 2018
Lear, Pinocchio, and The Three Musketeers

Usually, you go into the dark to see a play. My favorite place to see a show is the Ballard Underground. Even at midday on the brightest day of the year, it’s as dark as midnight in the basement of the Kress Building.

Volunteer Park amphitheater today was a different matter. No clouds. All sun.

That might seem like an odd venue to do King Lear, but nevertheless, Wooden O persisted. I was there today to see the show after Lear. I arrived near the end, about the time Gloucester jumps off the “cliff.” So it would not be fair to say much about the show but some of the lines (like the Earl) landed well.

When Lear said, while holding dead Cordelia, "Why should a dog, a horse, a rat, have life, / And thou no breath at all?" that line hit hard. The grief was there. Even though I did not have the context of the first 90 minutes of the play, and I was mostly a spectator (not audience) that moment was powerful enough to sweep me into the world of the play.

Pinocchio, by Theater Schmeater was what I was really there to see. In the bright afternoon sun, I could see the faces of the kids in the audience. They loved it.

But not at first! As the opening scene unfolded, I heard a couple of four- or five-year-olds heckling, basically. This is not the Pinocchio they expected, was the gist of their complaint. Pretty soon, though the big-nosed puppet appeared and we were off the races.

The show was a delight. Based on the Carlo Collodi novel but still similar to the Disney movie, it’s one bizarre thing after another – okay, now we’re stuck inside a whale for some reason – boo, here come that rotten fox and cat, they’re going to trip up Pinocchio – oh boy, they got him again, now he’s down a well!

With so many animal and marionette characters, and with it being a show for kids, there was constant motion. Highlights included Alyssa Woodbury as the Cricket, which she gave a unique physicality and a great chirp. Woodbury, as Columbina and Roger Estrada as Arlecchino were a treat together as dancing puppets of Mangiafuoco, one of the villains-along-the-way.

Bella Orobaton’s likeability and innocence as Pinocchio sustained the show and by the end, a couple of the toddlers had to be restrained from swarming the stage. Success!

Show number three: Ben Symons as d’Artagnan carried GreenStage’s The Three Musketeers with his charm, ease and comedic skill.

There are plots and counter-plots, intrigue and betrayal among kings and dukes and ladies and cardinals. It all gets a bit confusing about who is screwing whom but pretty soon there is a swordfight or a good, solid comical or dramatic scene and it all gets back on track for the big payoff at the end: all for one and one for all!

By that time the sun had left and it was time for me to do the same.

Photo by me of the Fox and the Cat in Pinocchio.

Originally published on my Facebook page on July 14, 2018.