Follow your nose to family theater

For the actors in the latest Bainbridge Performing Arts production, the chance to perform comes with strings attached.

In BPA’s adaptation of “Pinocchio,” many of the young cast play marionettes, tethered to a stage-within-a-stage that was designed and constructed by the high school-age stage crew.

When director Joanne Keegan calls them to attention, the half-dozen young actors lolling at the edge of the stage are instantly transformed into six wooden-looking puppets.

“They really studied marionettes to learn how they moved,” Keegan said. “And the ‘Bad Boys’ that lead Pinocchio astray in our play learned from watching the ‘Dead End Kids’ featured in 1930s films.”

Keegan says that her history of collaboration with writer Steven Fogell has helped her stage this “Pinocchio” adaptation. The two have worked together on productions at BPA and in Seattle.

“We have similar senses of humor,” Keegan said. “I know what will make him laugh. And this show is very funny. It’s got humor for the kids and for the adults in the audience, too.”

T he humor doesn’t mask the play’s dark side, however, a feature Fogell preserved in his adaptation of the book by 19th-century author Carlo Collodi.

In Collodi’s entertaining – and cautionary – tale, Pinnochio, a puppet who wants to become a real boy, goes on an archetypal epic journey that transforms him morally as well as physically.

“He comes to life as a boy, but basically Pinocchio is like a baby,” Keegan said. “He wakes up in Gepetto’s toy shop and everything is new. No wonder he gets into mischief.”

Since the show features actors in their first BPA play and others making a 10th appearance onstage, the production’s biggest challenge, Keegan says, is accommodating the range of acting experience.

Woodward seventh-grader Josie Anna Nickum, who plays Miss Tabby Cat in the current production, brings a background in theater to “Pinocchio” that includes parts in this season’s BPA show, “Secret Garden,” and Hyla Middle School’s production of “Midsummer Night’s Dream” staged in 2000-01.

“I like being on stage and making an audience laugh; it’s kind of a thrill,” Nickum said.

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Bainbridge Performing Arts’ presentation of “Pinocchio” was funded by the Ronald McDonald House Charities, and features 25 actors from BPA's fifth- through eighth-grade production class, supported by the high school-age stagecraft crew.

The 90-minute production plays 7:30 p.m. June 6-7 and 3 p.m. June 8 at the Playhouse. Tickets: $12/adults, $9/seniors and students; $5 discount coupons available at the Bainbridge McDonald’s. Information: www.theplayhouse.org.

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