In celebration of their 50th Anniversary, The White Lake Youth Theatre offers a musical adaptation of the children’s literature classic, The Wind in the Willows, this season.  The Wind in the Willows was first an award-winning book of animal tales by Kenneth Grahame, which began as a series of bedtime stories for his son, and was published in 1908. The beautifully written work, with its evocative descriptions of the countryside interspersed with exciting adventures, became a classic of English children’s literature. This musical children’s theatre version shares the adventures of several animal friends and neighbors in the English countryside—primarily Mole, Rat, Toad, and Badger. In this production, a large ensemble cast tells the story in an engaging, movement-rich presentation. Although the animals converse, philosophize, and behave like humans, each creature also retains its distinctive animal habits. The story begins when Mole decides to go to the riverbank one morning rather than do his spring cleaning. There he comes across his friend Rat, a water rat, and they spend the spring and summer together. One day they visit the irrepressible, generous, and boastful Mr. Toad, owner of Toad Hall, who possesses large amounts of money but not much brain. Toad is given to fads, and Mole and Rat join him in an excursion in his present enthusiasm, a horse-drawn caravan (a cart with beds and cooking equipment), until a speeding automobile frightens the horse and wrecks the caravan. While Mole and Rat are horrified by the contraption, Toad is completely mesmerized by the car. Mole and Rat later go to the Wild Wood to visit the kindly and responsible Badger, to whom they report that Toad has bought and smashed several automobiles. Together, they try to help their dear friend Mr. Toad after his obsession with motorcars gets him into all kinds of trouble. The cast detail many of Toad’s adventures in a choral, musical fashion, as he eventually steals a car and gets arrested, escapes, and is finally rescued, ending in a celebratory feast among the friends on the river bank. Tied together with movement and starring a large, ensemble cast of 8-18 year olds from the West Michigan shoreline, this iconic children’s story comes to life onstage, boldly portrayed by a wide range of ages and actors in our White Lake Youth Theatre company.

This production is generously underwritten by Carmichael Heating and Air Conditioning