This Weekend

OK, I love children's theater. I love it because the crowd, namely children, are the most honest audience you'll ever meet. If they are bored, they'll tell you- if they wet themselves, the whole audience will know. So when I saw my friend's show Gargoyle Garden at the Fringe Festival this weekend, I was so psyched to see many young children in the audience. Let's just say what I got was almost as good as seeing an action flick opening weekend at the local multiplex.

Here's some choice moments:

• After the narrator, the "Chimney Man" sang his beautiful opening song, some kid yelled out, "HE'S A MONSTER!!!" The actor improvised conversation with the kid, and assured him he was not a monster.
• During this adorable duet between the two kid actors who are communicating through a "brick wall" one of the young actors' character pulls out a loose brick so as to hear the girl better, and a kid screams, "YOU CAN'T BREAK BRICK! YOU CAN'T BREAK BRICK!" Like everything else up 'till then had been plausible.
• At the end one kid jumps up, "THAT WAS THE BEST THING I HAVE EVER SEEN! I LOVED IT! I LOVED IT!" I mean, the show was rather good but jeez kid, compared to Dora the Explorer on Ice and The Backyardigan's Live, this still won't live up to some of the greatest things you'll ever see, and $10 says those things will involve racy internet videos.