At the Brooklyn Children’s Museum two Saturdays ago, we opened If You Really Loved Polar Bears... to a crowd that included some of New York’s harshest theatre critics; however, these reviewers don’t write for a newspaper, or a magazine, or write at all. Most of them can’t even read. The under-eight crowd is very hard to please.
Brooke, our education director, tested the crowd during her opening speech. “If you love polar bears...put your hands on your head.” Success! Someone looking in the door might think we’re playing a game of Simon says, but it’s really more “If-we’re-not-bored-by-you-we’
In fact, they’re so hooked, they become rowdy. We ask for three volunteers, five run on stage. They’re requested to put their arms up and fly, several of them run throughout the space. Some of the taller audience members, the ones who’ve been taught to sit in your seat and be quiet during a performance, have trouble with all the energy and try leaving. But the little critics won’t have it. They break loose from their parents and run back, they stubbornly sit on the ground, a few even through tantrums in the hall. In TYA terms, we’ve got a smash hit!
But what about education? They had a good time, but did they learn anything? A few days after the performance, I ran into one of our board members. “Thanks again for the show. Our daughter really loved it. She even tried lecturing one of her friends on global warming and turning off the water in her shower to make the world better for Polar Bears.”
So it did stick--we had achieved our goal. We didn’t just entertain, we educated. “That’s great!” I told him “How’d her friend react to the lecture.” He became his daughter’s friend for a moment “So what?” with a shrug of nonchalance, following up with “she didn’t really care,” in his own voice.
“That’s okay,” I responded, “we’ve still got two weekends of performances.”
