PINOCCHIO reviews!

International Students of Wheelock College, saw and reviewed PINOCCHIO. I am posting 3 of them here... and they are a good read and an interesting perspective!

Christabelle Peter

The acting skills of everyone on stage are fantastic. They played their characters really good that you can tell each of their characteristics from the audience point of view. The caught my attention was the words they used like yen, beef stew, pachinko, and more. These words blends in Japanese setting till I feel like ordering a ramen from the stall. Addition to that, the dancing also caught my eye as the movement of the dancers remind me of a Japanese painting called “The Great Wave off Kanagawa” because they movement looks like a wave. Other than that, I also realized that the person who dances behind the Blue Fairy resembles her shadow.

From all the characters, my favourite is the snail that passes by at a certain time of the scene. It was confusing at first about its appearance but then I notice it represents the time that passed by. The snail also have its part when he told Pinocchio of Blue Fairy’s condition. My favourite scene is when the snail picks up its body like a dress and ran off immediately. It is not realistic like a real snail but the actor gave a humorous and playful scene to us as he was doing so.

Alaye Princewill

Compared to the Pinocchio I have read and watched when I was a child, the play was very similar and slightly different. It starts off with a man named Geppetto. When the gentle woodcarver Geppetto builds a puppet to be his son, a fairy brings the toy to life, the boy could move and talk its name was Pinocchio hopes to become a real boy someday. The fairy appointed a cricket to look over Pinocchio. But even with the help of his cricket friend who the fairy assigned to be his guide Pinocchio seemed to struggle and have problems. Instead of going to school he gets tricked by two puppeteers who lied that they could make him rich. He found and made a friend and they both were deceived and taken to toy land. Toy land is a place for lazy kids, they played all day and both won, after winning the next morning they started changing into donkeys gradually and eventually were sold. Pinocchio was swallowed by a whale, the same whale that swallowed his father eventually they got out. The blue fairy rewarded him by transforming him into a real boy.

I enjoyed watching the real play because it was very creative, it made me laugh that’s why I kept watching and it caught the eyes of the audience. The Pinocchio story tells you to go after your goals. The plot was perfect, the purpose of the play was delivered or transferred to the audience. I think the acting was played well, the way the characters displayed their behavior, dancing and following the rhythm of the music which was played at the right time.

Michael Ly

“Pinocchio” is a play about the love in family, between parents and children, the strong relationship in family. Pinocchio, the wooden boy, care about his father, he leave home to find gold. He meet and overcome many challenge, also, his father go very long way to find him. At last, they meet each other and together to overcome the last challenge. Finally, Pinocchio is became the real boy.

The light is suitable to the background or the main topic is going on in the state. The connecting between light and music caught customer’s attention. The changing of the background had the appearance of many people. But it did not make the viewer feel uncomfortable, they can feel more natural. The costumes were suitable with the character and the Japanese scene in the play.

In all characters, I like the snail. He is the symbols as the time go through, also, I think it is the symbol of trying. From the beginning, he went slow and moved the rock. To the end, the number of rock was more, this was the result for his trying. In addition to, the snail was also very fun, when someone caught his rock and Pinocchio told him to send mail, he ran very fast. That point made audience very fun.

Gareth

When I watching the comedy which called Pinocchio, I really pleasantly surprised about it because I had never seen a Western comedy has a lot of Eastern culture elements like Pinocchio.

As an oriental people, I am very glad to see that oriental and occidental cultures combined in this comedy: Kabuki and Peking opera are combined with a western fairy comedy and audiences do not feel strange. Several Japanese words spoken by the actors: Sushi, Yen…etc.

The props design and lighting are also very attractive. Pinocchio is a fairy comedy, so actors prepared lots of props which consist with the subject like scooter and fountain, these props can make audiences feel warm and attract their attention. Besides, the lighting also very fits with the plot of comedy.

Then, the most important thing is the story. Pinocchio is a very old story of European fairy, but we saw many Asian actors and African American actors perform in this comedy, I think it is prove the inclusiveness of American culture and convey love to all the audience. In this comedy, people can experience love, brave and friendly from this story and I believe it is the real meaning of this comedy.

 

Meng-wei Chen

Pinocchio just like us he did something wrong many times and finally he knows what is the right. He’s a regular adolescent trying to figure out how the world works and, more importantly, how he can navigate it. He is always shown the error of his ways and promises to change but he most often repeats the same mistakes. Experience is the best teacher. The best way to learn is to experience mistakes.

At some stage while growing up, children “challenge” the authority of their parents. In the story, Pinocchio always cries out for his father but he don’t know his father was do a lot for him. His father is really poor that he cannot grow up in the rich environment but he’d like to sale he only coat to get book for Pinocchio. He loves his father but maybe he don’t know how to use right way to expression in this stage.

Don’t be gullible. Pinocchio runs into the Cat and Fox. He thought they are his best friends, but the true is they just want his money. In this reality world, we can have many friends but not all friends are all true for you. However, we still need to trust if we are to develop meaning and lasting relationships with other people. In other words, don’t be too trusting.

Tell the truth. I thought that this was all about telling lies and regretting it because every time Pinocchio tells a lie, his nose grows longer.

Don’t give in to peer-pressure. We all want to fit in especially when we are ne to a certain environment. Pinocchio has resolved to himself to be a good boy and he goes back to school and studies diligently. But he saw the other kids were not going to school so he followed. Wrong move.

Pinocchio not just a story, I think the author want to expression some experience and through this story to tell reader which meaning inside.

A ‘Pinocchio’ that owes more to Kabuki than Disney

By Joel Brown; Globe Correspondent, January 29, 2015

A Kabuki-influenced version of “Pinocchio” may strike some as the sort of theatrical experiment best suited to an avant-garde troupe performing in a dimly lit basement. But Wendy Lement and Steven Bogart are putting it on the big stage at Wheelock Family Theatre beginning Saturday. They promise all the laughs and tugged heartstrings traditional to the tale of the wooden puppet who wants to become a real boy, along with some new shading.

“When we went back to the original story, I was startled at how funny it is,” says Lement, Wheelock’s producer and co-artistic director. “It’s both hysterically funny and very dark in places, and both of those are combined in Kabuki.”

Kabuki is a highly stylized form of traditional Japanese drama involving singing, dancing, and elaborate costumes and makeup. With performances through Feb. 22 at Wheelock, this “Pinocchio” is a world premiere version of the story of the mischievous creation of the poor puppeteer Geppetto.

Lement joined Wheelock in 2012, and this is only the second season that she has programmed herself. She had known Bogart since they were both students at Emerson in the 1980s and thought of him as she looked to bring new creative voices to Wheelock.

Bogart is known both for working with young people and for his restless creativity. After 22 years as a Lexington High School drama teacher, he’s been building his name as a playwright and director around the city. He helmed a memorable “Cabaret” for the American Repertory Theater, with his former student Amanda Palmer as the Emcee. Next up, he’ll direct the New England premiere of “Shockheaded Peter” for Company One, featuring the “steamcrunk” band Walter Sickert & The Army of Broken Toys.

“I floated the idea of doing a ‘Pinocchio’ that he would direct,” Lement says, “and also the idea of setting it in a non-Western culture. That has to do very much with the mission of the theater — of nontraditional casting, but also exposing the audience to theater of different cultures.”

But if it was not set in Pinocchio’s native Italy, then where? Soon she and Bogart discovered their mutual experience with Japanese theater. Lement had directed a couple of Kabuki-influenced shows. Bogart lived in Japan for six months in his 20s, had a Japanese painting teacher here for many years, and even spoke the language, although he says he’s no longer fluent.

They saw how masks and transformations were common to Japanese theater and “Pinocchio,” the 1880s novel by Carlo Collodi that spawned countless adaptations, including Disney’s classic animated film.

“We’re not Kabuki experts, we’re not doing pure, traditional Kabuki,” Bogart says. “We’re Kabuki influenced, Noh influenced, even Butoh theater-influenced, pulling all of these elements in to create the story.”

So audiences will face a stage backed by sliding screens, not unlike those in a traditional Japanese-style home, that here can be moved to change the scene. Movement and dance and masks will echo Japanese styles. The band on an upper deck of the set will include a skilled player of the shamisen, a traditional three-stringed Japanese instrument. And as for the marine creature in whose belly Pinocchio ends up . . .

“In the novel, the whale is not a whale, it’s a dogfish. I don’t know how big a dogfish is, but the Disney version turned it into a whale,” Bogart says. “We did some research and found a character, Namazu, in Japanese mythology, which is a giant catfish. It’s so big, it’s controlled by a god, and when the god is not paying attention, Namazu creates earthquakes and tsunamis.”

Big enough, then, to swallow a puppet and puppetmaster. But this “Pinocchio” isn’t just about tradition. “We looked at Pinocchio and all of the temptations that pull him away from family, from Geppetto, that get him into trouble — and we looked at them as modern-day Tokyo,” Lement says.

Consider their Playland — known as The Land of Toys in the novel, Pleasure Island in the Disney film — where kids turn into donkeys because they’re playing all day. “We looked at what they would be playing all day long in Japan, so that years could go by in a sense, and Steve came up with the idea of pachinko” — a kind of vertical pinball game that originated in Japan.

“Japan is this amazing place of the old and new living together,” Bogart says. “Modern Japan is all this crazy, city, neon, fast-paced life, but then there are these gorgeous pagodas and temples that crop up everywhere,” and that mix is what they’re trying to capture.

The cast includes 17-year-old Sirena Abalian as Pinocchio and veteran Boston actor Steven Barkhimer as Geppetto, with music composed and conducted by Mary Bichner and sets by Cristina Todesco.

Abalian starred in Wheelock’s 2013 production of “Pippi Longstocking,” and Lement says she brings high energy and comic timing to the role of Pinocchio. Many actors, including boys, auditioned for the part, but Bogart and Lement kept coming back to Abalian. (The actress is a Lexington student, but she and Bogart never overlapped there.)

Bogart and Lement collaborated on the script. “Steve would come to me occasionally and say, ‘Is this too weird?’ And I’d say, ‘No, I love it.’ And then I’d go to him and say, ‘Is this too out there?’ And he’d say, ‘No!’ We’re sort of on the same page.”

They moved away from Disney moods to get at the underlying ideas of Collodi’s novel, which also fit well with the Japanese motif, such as the Blue Fairy that crops up in various guises throughout the show and serves as Pinocchio’s conscience. That doesn’t mean their version isn’t animated in its own way.

Lement: “The Blue Fairy is Geppetto’s wife who has died at the beginning. He is mourning her loss in front of a tree at her grave — the tree is there, and she is the tree. He’s feeling sorry for himself, and she takes a part of herself, a branch, and it goes flying into him, and she says, ‘Do something with your life!’ ”

Bogart: “He ignores that and the log starts jumping up and hitting him. ‘Do something!’ And it becomes Pinocchio’s voice, and he makes Pinocchio out of that log.”

Girl Scouts and Cookies coming to Pinocchio!

Troop 76269, Brownie & Junior Girl Scouts, will host a cookie sale in the lobby of the Wheelock Family Theatre on Sunday, February 8th at 5pm; after the 3pm show of Pinocchio!

Thin Mints, Peanut Butter Patties, Caramel deLites, Lemonades, Peanut Butter Sandwiches, Trefoil Shortbreads, Thanks-A-Lots, and Cranberry Citrus Crisps, all cookies are $4.00 a box.

There is also a new trial cookie; a gluten-free, chocolate chip, peanut butter, oatmeal cookie for $5.00 a bag, "Trios".

Both troops are using the proceeds from the cookie sale to fund badge work, trips and service projects.

Additionally, you can support the Girl Scouts and donate purchased cookies to Rosie's Place. The Girl Scouts of Eastern Massachusetts are involved with Cookies for a Cause and donating to the Greater Boston Food Bank and troops overseas.




Join the Girl Scouts on Sunday February 8!

PINOCCHIO study guide excerpt...

Carlo Collodi, the author of Pinocchio, was born Carlo Lorenzini in 1826 in Florence, Italy. When he began to write for publication, he adopted the name Collodi, after the town in which his mother was born.

As a young man Collodi worked as a bookseller. He later became a journalist, motivated by an interest in Italy’s political situation. At that time Italy was not a unified nation as it is today, but rather a patchwork of governments, many of which were controlled by other countries. Collodi supported a movement to make Italy an independent nation. To that end, at the age of 22 he founded a newspaper called Il Lampione (The Lamp Post), which combined satiric humor and news. The movement was successful and Italy became one nation around 1871, with Rome as its capital.

Collodi continued working as a magazine editor. He also began translating French fairy tales. Writing his own children’s tales was a logical next step. In 1881, Pinocchio appeared as a serial in Giornale dei Bambini (Journal for Children), a magazine responding to the increasing interest in children’s literature. The story of the puppet/boy Pinocchio, whose independent spirit and gullibility land him in increasingly dramatic situations, was immediately popular. Church leaders, however, disapproved, fearing it would encourage a rebellious spirit in the nation’s youth.

Initially Collodi ended the story with Pinocchio hanged in a tree, presumed dead. The author had no intention of reviving him, but the public clamored for Pinocchio’s return. So, Collodi brought the puppet back to life and sent him on even more sensational adventures.

Create Your Own Children’s Newspaper

Like Carlo Collodi, create your own newspaper and fill it with humorous articles.

What is the name of your newspaper?

Write a funny story, or an article poking fun at something.

Illustrate your newspaper, either with your own drawings, or with images from magazines. Remember, the newspaper is supposed to be amusing.

As a reporter, write a humorous article about an episode in a book or a play as if it actually happened.

Create your own new adventure for Pinocchio before he becomes a boy.

Now imagine you are going to write a book called Pinocchio’s Life as a Real Boy. Create an episode of his life as a boy, and share your story with the class.  How do the adventures compare? Which stories do you prefer?

 

PINOCCHIO costume designs by Miranda Hoffman

2014 - 2015 Season!

Announcing Wheelock Family Theatre’s 2014-2015 Season

of Professional, Affordable Theatre for Every Generation

 

ALICE

October 17 – November 16, 2014

A new musical written and directed by Andrew Barbato

Based on the book “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland” by Lewis Carroll

Musical Director: Robert L. Rucinski. Composer: Lesley DeSantis. Orchestration: Garrett Taylor. Choreographer: Carla Martinez. Scenic design: Matthew T. Lazure. Costume design: Lisa Simpson. Props Design: Marjorie Lusignan. Sound design: Roger Moore.

 

This new adaptation sends us on a fantastical coming of age adventure. Alice, relying on her wit and empathy, must negotiate the seemingly arbitrary rules of polite society; the tea parties, the poetry recitals, the croquet matches, and the important dates with royalty. In this distorted adult world of Wonderland, will Alice retain her dreams when pressured by the capricious nature of conformity?

 

 

PINOCCHIO

January 30 – February 22, 2015

Written by Steven Bogart and Wendy Lement

Directed by Steven Bogart

Based on the book “The Adventures of Pinocchio” by Carlo Colladi

Musical director/Composer: Mary Bichner. Choreographer: Patricia Manalo Bochnak. Scenic design: Cristina Todesco. Lighting Design: David Wilson. Costume design: Miranda Hoffman. Sound design: Roger Moore. Props & Puppet design: Marjorie Lusignan. Puppet Coach: Roxanna Myhrum.* .  

An original adaption, influenced by Japanese traditions of Kabuki, Noh, and Bunraku puppetry, Pinocchio will surprise and delight audiences of all ages. Mystical creatures, live musicians, and gymnastic choreography make the magical transformation of an animated puppet to a real boy, a dynamic and deeply moving experience. Despite being lured away from his loving home by promises of instant fame, fast money, and a life of fun and leisure, the impetuous Pinocchio must learn what is truly important in life.

 

THE TASTE OF SUNRISE

March 13 – 22, 2015

Directed by Wendy Lement and Kristin Johnson.

Written by Suzan L. Zeder – PART TWO OF THE WARE TRILOGY, produced with Emerson Stage (Mother Hicks) and Central Square Theatre (The Edge of Peace)

Composer: Peter Stewart. Choreographer: Patricia Manalo Bochnak. Scenic design: Janie Howland. Lighting design: Annie Weigand. Costume design: Lisa Simpson. Props design: Marjorie Lusignan. Sound design: Roger Moore.

 

This bilingual play—performed in American Sign Language and spoken English—is the second play in Zeder’s critically acclaimed Ware Trilogy; which will be produced in its entirety in collaboration with Emerson Stage and Central Square Theatre.  The Taste of Sunrise takes place in the mind and memory of Tuc, who journeys through his childhood from the fever dream that took his hearing, to the language of nature that he shares with his father, to the deaf school where his mind explodes with the discovery of sign language. Tuc meets the mysterious Nell Hicks, who heals with herbs and singing spells; Roscoe, who gives Tuc his name-sign and cultural identity; and Maizie, a wild child of deaf parents with a head full of movie palace dreams. After the death of his father, Tuc navigates the perilous path of love, loss, and language to weave a family out of wishes. An ensemble of Deaf and hearing directors, designers, and actors explore the cultural complexities of deafness with humor and compassion.

 

SHREK the MUSICAL

April 17 – May 24, 2015

Directed by Shelley Bolman

Book and Lyrics by David Lindsay Abaire. Music by Jeanine Tesori. Based on the Dreamworks film “Shrek”.

Musical director: Matthew Stern. Choreographer: Patricia Manalo Bochnak. Scenic design: Matthew T. Lazure. Costume design: Charles G. Baldwin & Lisa Simpson. Props & Puppet Design: Marjorie Lusignan. Puppet Coach: Roxanna Myhru in collaboration with Puppet Showplace Theatre. Sound design: Roger Moore.

 

The 2008 Broadway smash about a horrible ogre, a feisty princess and a garrulous donkey,  Shrek the Musical simultaneously subverts and fulfills fairy-tale expectations. With wit and a mischievous humor, we follow our misanthropic, green hero as he learns about the power of friendship and the magical nature of love; all while thwarting a dastardly villain. Based on the irreverent book by William Steig and the award-winning animated film by DreamWorks, this singing, dancing extravaganza explores the relative nature of beauty, the beguiling myth of “happily-ever-after”, and the importance of accepting yourself for who you really are.

 

Wheelock Family Theatre is a professional, non-profit theatre associated with Actor’s Equity, the union of professional actors and stage managers. Located on the campus of Wheelock College, Wheelock Family Theatre seeks to improve the lives of children and families through the shared experience of live theatre.