Theater For Kids Has Magic Touch On-The-Road Actors Hope Youngsters’ Imaginations Enlivened By Contact With Stage
“The Houdini Boys” rolled into town Thursday with their traveling carnival show.
Their big top was the Ponderosa Elementary School gymnasium.
Their audience was a crowd of children generally too sophisticated to believe that magic tricks really are magic.
But when Dash Houdini pulled coins out of ears and his big brother Harry mysteriously restored a length of rope he had just snipped in two, they earned the age-old response to wellexecuted magic tricks - gasps and hung jaws.
“The Houdini Boys” is the latest production of the Idaho Theater for Youth, which is just finishing up a three-week tour in North Idaho.
The Citizens Council for the Arts, with a grant from the Idaho Commission on the Arts, helped bring the professional theater group to North Idaho schools this spring.
After 12 weeks on the road all over the state, the three-person troupe will have performed 150 times.
“It’s demanding,” said a slightly disheveled Dan Peterson as he dismantled the set after his third performance Thursday.
Peterson is playing Erich Weiss, the enthusiastic performer whose stage name was Harry Houdini. His younger brother, Theo Weiss or Dash Houdini, was played by Mark Anthony Taylor.
They were joined by Gina Ojile, who played the Conjurer, the carnival stage manager and the swaggering sheriff who dared Houdini to escape from an official pair of handcuffs.
Houdini succeeded, of course.
“Will wonders ever cease, ladies and gentlemen? Will wonders ever cease?” the Houdini brothers bellowed to the audience at their feet.
A few boys on the floor near the side of the small set scooted around further, trying to get a better view of the magic tricks. Kris Schultz, 12, claimed that the secret of the handcuff escape was a pair of release buttons.
“They hit them together like this,” he said, knocking his wrists together.
“Don’t try any of this stuff on your own, OK?” Peterson cautioned as the play ended. The tail end of his comments were drowned out as students hurried outside to catch their rides home.
The actors had to rush the Ponderosa show. The process of moving more than 600 children in and out of Ponderosa’s gym for two separate shows took nearly 15 minutes, cutting into their allotted hour.
Given those distractions, the creators of Idaho Theatre for Youth still believe that their performances will help students gain a better appreciation for theater.
“It’s about stimulating their imagination in far different ways than movies or even books can,” said artistic director David Lee Painter. “Hopefully, it will empower them to follow their own dreams.”