In 1943, French poet and pilot Antoine de Saint-Exup�ry wrote and illustrated a story about a world-weary aviator who crash-landed in a desert and, in that most unlikely place, met a little voyager who lived on a planet no bigger than a house. This youthful person loved a Rose, befriended a Fox and shivered at the sight of a Snake. He became The Aviator’s close friend and finest teacher. The author called him and his story The Little Prince.
For 60 years, children all over the world have thrilled to this remarkable young man’s adventure and, like The Aviator, have traveled with The Little Prince to a deeper understanding of loyalty, responsibility and friendship. People’s Light and Theatre Company is presenting the stage version of the children’s story, adapted by Rick Cummins and John Scoullar, as part of its Family Discovery Series.
Children’s theater director Shannon O’Donnell explains that The Little Prince explores the process of making a friendship. "It’s a process that requires patience, responsibility and dependability to create trust and finally find understanding. Both The Little Prince and The Aviator have to learn how this can be done before they can return home.
"This story is so deeply loved, and I think that’s because it inhabits the imagination and sparks memories of our own experiences of friendship, loyalty, loneliness, betrayal, loss, death, God, love, fear and regret," O’Donnell added. "And our reaction to the story is ever-changing — we understand it differently as we grow and gather experiences. This is a story that speaks to people at all different stages of their lives."
The cast of The Little Prince features associate artistic director and company member Stephen Novelli as The Aviator, and introduces Antoine McClary, a longtime member of the theatre’s New Voices Ensemble, as The Little Prince. Resident actor Aisha Hobbs plays The Rose, and company member Cathy Simpson is The Snake. Guest artist Michael Cruz returns as The Fox and the Men on the Planets.
The People’s Light production has its own charms, and is presented with a simplicity that is noteworthy. It brings to life the timeless story of the downed pilot in the Sahara Desert and the regal little boy who helps him to rediscover himself and that "what is essential is invisible to the eye."
Saint-Exup�ry was a real-life hero who looked at adventure and danger with poet’s eyes — sometimes from a point of view of a child. For example, he wrote, "Grownups never understand anything for themselves, and it is tiresome for children to be always and forever explaining things to them," and "You know you’ve achieved perfection in design not when you have nothing more to add, but when you have nothing more to take away."
The show is conscientiously true to the spirit and language of the book. But, unlike Peter Pan or Mary Poppins, The Little Prince does not have adventures that are easily dramatized. It is essentially a reverie imagined in that most sterile of settings — a desert. And despite the best efforts of a talented cast, this children’s show lacks the sparkle that some kids have come to expect.
The show’s biggest assets are the performances by Novelli, who projects a blend of critical intelligence and poignancy as the lost aviator; Hobbs as the love-starved prickly rose, and Cathy Simpson as the colorful snake who gives the tale a wistful closure, prompting the prince’s heavenly dispatch.
O’Donnell offers some explanations about the lost aviator’s journey and the chance encounter with the little prince: "Sometimes the result of our journey is to have our questions answered, our understanding of the world expanded, but sometimes, we discover there are things we can’t know, and we learn how to live with an uncertainty that invites us to keep questioning, to keep expanding our understanding, and to change the way we see our world by putting our faith in unseen things."
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The Little Prince
The People’s Light and Theatre Company
39 Conestoga Road
Malvern, Pa.
Through May 18
Tickets: Adults, $20; children, $12
610-644-3500
