Skip navigation

Category Archives: Review

If You Give a Mouse a Cookie Review (KC Parent)

KC Parent named Theatre for Young America’s current production of If You Give a Mouse a Cookie starring Noelia Rothery and Coleman Crenshaw one of it’s Top Picks for October.

Excerpts from Kristina Light’s review below:

Laura Joffe Numeroff’s “If you…” popular Children’s Series keeps kids laughing. Fans of the series will love “If you Give a Mouse a Cookie” at Theatre for Young America.

[…]

If you take a child to a “good” children’s show it will hold their attention without fidgets and wiggles. If you take a child to a “great” chidlren’s show it will set the entire audience into roars of laughter and leave the children talking about the performance all day long…. and then they’ll want to tell daddy all about it… and then they’ll want to tell grandma… and then they’ll want to tell their aunts… and then they’ll wake up the next morning wanting to see the show again…. and that is just what happened at my house after attending opening day of Theatre for Young America’s “If You Give a Mouse a Cookie.”

[…]

The show is full of good old-fashioned physical humor and slapstick. The creativity of the cast played out well and with each stunt the mouse pulled, the children roared with laughter.

[…]

If you’re looking for fun entertainment for little ones this fall, consider an outing to TYA’s “If You Give a Mouse a Cookie.”  We recommend this show for early elementary and preschool children.

For the full review at KC Parent click here.

If You Give a Mouse a Cookie runs through November 12th at the H&R Block City Stage on Level B of Union Station.  Showtimes vary, but 10am Tuesdays-Fridays and 1pm on Saturdays will always get you there for a show.  For tickets and showtimes visit Union Station Ticketing.

More about Rubble

Here is an excerpt from Angie Fielder Sutton’s excellent piece “Spotlight on Heidi Van” in KC Stage that discusses a bit about Rubble.

Rubble is returning for an encore performance this First Friday (Sept. 2nd) at 9:30pm following a 8pm Cocktail reception and Benefit at The Fishtank Performance Studio.

HYBRID, however, doesn’t do just that – in fact, it’s HYBRID that’s doing the show at the Fringe Festival this year. “I try once a year to produce something on my own of my vision,” Van says, “because most often, I’m producing or co-producing other people’s work.”
The play, “Rubble”, was inspired by the Joplin tornado. Van, who is co-creating the piece with Coleman Crenshaw, says that goes once again back to part of why she created the Fishtank.

“My passion is to create original works that are kind of reflective of current events that are happening in society and the society that we’re living in,” Van says. “I’m really inspired by time and place – like what is happening now in Kansas City or what is happening now in the Midwest or what is happening now in the world news. Those are the things that motivate me.” The tornado in Joplin got her thinking about other natural disasters that have taken place recently, mixed in with the end of the world prophecies that were being talked about, and “all these really weird things that the Earth does and how we as humans respond to it and how we deal with it. So it’s also dealing with the tragedy of the situation and finding hope.”

Van calls the play a window play, as it’s performed in the window of the Fishtank on the sidewalk. So, there’s an outside play of things happening on the street and on the sidewalk, and another play that happens inside the window. “They’re both very different from each other and presented in very different styles, so I’m excited that we have that all worked out,” she says with a grin.

[…]

“Rubble” will be part of the sixth Fringe Festival, and more information can be found at either the Fringe’s (www.kcfringe.org) or on the Fishtank’s (www.fishtanktheater.com) website. Most of this article came from the interview with Heidi Van on the Stage Savvypodcast episode 5, which you can find in its entirety on angiefsutton.wordpress.com.

Angie Fiedler Sutton review of Rubble

Hybrid’s “Rubble”, KC Fringe Festival, Review on Stage Savvy
Sunday, July 24, 2011
by Angie Fiedler Sutton – Look for the signs.

Kansas City, MO – infoZine – Performed both in the front window and outside on the street, “Rubble” is a performance piece that delves into devastation and our reactions to it – and is truly what I think of when I think of the concept of fringe theatre. Being on the street, with the inevitable sirens and helicopters, adds to the atmosphere because of the inherent concept of the production.

Like abstract art or a David Lynch film, it’s hard to go too much into what the piece was about without explaining it away as a whole – and this is a piece that needs to be experienced, not explained. But on the surface, five performers are on the outside, while two are in the window. While the two pieces seem to be independent of each other, it ends up tying in together and making a statement (at least to me) about how we, as watchers, sometimes miss what’s ‘really’ going on in the world.

Rubble photo
Photo courtesy of Richard Sutton

Heidi Van, with signs about signs, seems to be the tying thread between the pieces.

The entire cast was flawless in their presentation, with special notice to Gail Bronfman-Bunch for her singing, and both Andy Perkins and Coleman Crenshaw, as the two men in the window, for their Godot-like performances.

I can barely describe the music, played by Katelyn Boone, Katy Guillen, and Peter Lawless, who created it, – at times haunting and creepy, and others adding to the quirky humor. It was a perfect soundtrack to this performance piece.

The Larval Masks were……… Read more at Stage Savvy