Play Review THE LIGHT PRINCESS

The Light Princess, which we saw at Tucson’s Scoundrel and Scamp Theatre is a lightweight script that has been infused with clunky music and some well-intentioned young actors who are light in experience.  This made for a recipe that that was less than tasty.    

The story is lifted from a fairy tale and involves a princess who has been cursed by the Queen’s witch sister.  The “light” in the title refers to the curse which releases the young woman from gravity.  The King and Queen spend their time trying to find a way to reinstate gravity in their daughter’s life and that leads to the proverbial test of three suitors who come to try their luck in grounding the girl.  

With a lot of locations, a small stage, and not much of a scenery budget, we get a few wagons to push about and a lot of billowing cloths to stand in for water.  It was all serviceable but did not rise above that.

The show did focus on children and it starts early with several of the cast members jollying young audience members with chat and hula hoop contests. My view was that their attempts seemed rather forced. This foreshadowed the audience participation in the show, which was minimal and pretty half-hearted.      

Solid performances by the Queen and the Witch, who are older and more experienced, did help the show. The Light Princess herself has a light voice and winning smile but I kept feeling bad for the young, not so burly,  men who had to keep her in the air for extended periods.  The rest of the kids in the cast (who appear to mainly be U. A. students or recent grads) try to make the outing exciting, but blowing on broken horns and noisemakers isn’t quite enough. They will certainly improve if they keep at it, but right now they aren’t capable of rising above a shaky script. 

One issue with the uninspired music was that the so called “real” songs did not appear to be much better than the so called “bad songs” composed by the chosen prince. The music also suffers a bit by being hammered out on a single piano. Even though the cast tries to help with some tambourines and box pounding percussion, the score just seems thin.  

This is the first show I have seen by this troupe and though I was disappointed, I will get in line to see one of their more mature offerings.