A Year with Frog and Toad

Dates and Venue 17 Apr - 8 May | Waterfront Theatre, Granville Island, Vancouver

Reviewer Ed Farolan

Carousel Theatre has consistently these past 35 years served theatre for young audiences here in Vancouver. This season, their theme is ‘friends and neighbours’, and the company under the guidance of Artistic Director Carole Higgins has been producing a fabulous collection of stories for for two year olds, four year olds, teens, parents, and grandparents..

The Frog and Toad is a children's story based on Arnold Lobel's well-loved characters which eventually made its way into a popular Broadway children's musical, "from the page to the stage", so to speak. The actors didn't wear any costumes or masks representing their characters, dressing up more like human beings. However, they did hoplike frogs, and all the chaacters sang and dance faithful to the characters they played, whether they were birds, frogs or other animals.

This Carousel production features Todd Talbot as 'Frog' and Allan Zinyk as 'Toad', together with other cast members Darren Burkett, Janet Gigliotti and Kaylee Harwood. They managed to entertain the children in the audience, getting them to laugh at their antics.

Director Carole Higgins and Musical Director Gordon Roberts did a great job getting the kids to laugh and enjoy this 55-minute show. Choreographer Melissa Young created those standard Broadway sing-and-dance routines to the delight of the children.

Upcoming show is Shakespeare's As You Like It (May 12-15), a co-production with Touchstone Theatre, directed by Katrina Dunn and Carole Higgins.