Tuesday, September 28, 2010

Pinkalicious: Sweet as can be


I was a little late to the Pinkalicious phenomenon, but the book is a delightful read--one that speaks directly to my 3 year old and still appeals to my 5 year old. So when Chicago's Emerald City Theatre mounted a "direct from Off-Broadway" revue of the stage production, I snapped up* tickets.

Josh and I took the girls to the Saturday morning show. Unlike most of the small children in the audience, mine weren't wearing fancy pink tulle dresses or toting pink cupcake purses, but A had slipped on her favorite brown cupcake t-shirt, and Z refused to take off her pink jacket, so we didn't look like total misfits.

The crowd, not surprisingly, was young and partial to pigtails. Most of the little girls appeared to be in the 3 to 4 range--which makes a lot of sense, really. There isn't much theatre appropriate for preschoolers.

Z and A ate it up. I was curious how anyone could stretch a fairly short picture book into a 1 hour musical, but Pinkalicious manages with lots of songs, a sprinkling of audience interaction and the kind of slapstick humor that doesn't really tickle my funny bone, but gives my daughters fits. The fact that even my youngest could recite the plot points on the drive to the theatre helped a lot too: I didn't spend the entire 60 minutes fielding "why's that man doing that?" questions. Instead, knowing roughly what was coming next, their faces positively glowed with anticipation.

Tickets are $13 a child. Adults are $16.

*By snapped up, I mean I responded to the press relations agent who'd been sending me near-daily releases on the show with a polite request for review tickets.