I don't know about you but have you noticed the lack of children's theatre at seaside resorts in the UK? I know when I was younger, there were lots of small sideshows for family entertainment, like Punch and Judy and Magic Shows.
I think of everywhere I have been over the summer I have seen two shows, one at Land's End where there was a magic act for children and a guy doing football tricks in Leeds City Centre. I know this is not what you would class as 'serious' theatre but every performance that you see is important in some way, especially for children of a young age.
Young children respond well to bright colours and simple, educational story lines. It helps stimulate the imagination of these young minds and develops their creativity. They like to laugh and join in with magic shows and similar talent acts; but where are all these disappearing to?
As well as the decline of children's street theatre, I've noticed an increase of children's cinema, which is all very well and good because as a society we need to develop but we all know that watching TV all day is not good for you so starting this from a young age can't be good can it? Yes, it helps the learning development of young children and helps parents control a busy household by putting on children's programmes so they have something to do but really we should be promoting healthier options, like going out to the theatre or seaside and finding sideshows to watch.
I might just be naive and there are still lots of acts like this around the UK, but I do know that there aren't as much as there used to be when I was small. It's not as if I have been ignorant and haven't noticed these around because I have two cousins which are quite young and I like to find things for them to experience.
Should we produce more street theatre for children and families? Is media taking over theatre? Let me know what you think. Sorry this is a short post.
:D
The Punch and Judy format has faded away in reality and general perception, a lot of it is to do with the PC brigade in the last 20 years. It's gone from mainstream Hollywood in the likes of the Marx bros' "Monkey Business" to near exitinction. The last mainstream sighting of a P&J show I can think off was grumpy old Mr Partidge in Hi-di-Hi, and that wasn't exactly a resurgence of the format! Guess things have moved on to TV puppets, with no end of telly-tubby type of characters, and out on the streets there's loads of mascot/meet and greet type of dressed up characters. Different times and different ways, but still all 'kids theatre' in a fashion.
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