by Molly Gilmore for OLY ARTS This summer at the Hands On Children’s Museum, kids can fight fires, meet superheroes, climb a rock wall and explore the wonders of outer space. All this and more are part of the museum’s second-annual “Summer Splash,” a summer-long series of special events and activities that last year drew …
by Kelli Samson for OLY ARTS At the start of every summer, Olympia Family Theater’s production season ends, making way for the training of future thespians. The audiences and rhythms of the past nine months change. Rehearsal schedules give way for day camps, and guests switch from theater patrons to children aged 5 to 12. …
THEATER REVIEW by Alec Clayton for OLY ARTS What a wonderful play! Fishnapped! at Olympia Family Theater is a wildly rocking, sweet, touching musical, ostensibly for kids but a treat for all ages. It’s a world premiere, too, locally written by Amy Shephard and Andrew Gordon with music and lyrics by Daven Tillinghast and directed …
by Kelli Samson for OLY ARTS Jason Haws is a shapeshifter. Whether onstage or in front of a classroom, he glides effortlessly between roles and is utterly unforgettable in each, always stealing the show. As director Brian Tyrrell, who’s known him for over twenty years, articulates, “Jason Haws is a chameleon.” Though Haws had dreams …
by Christina Butcher for OLY ARTS Although this year’s Procession of the Species has come and gone, the festivities continue to have a resounding impact on at Madison Elementary School. Earlier this spring, the student body adopted an iconic procession-art piece and joined the parade for the first time. “Participating in the procession was a …
by Molly Gilmore for OLY ARTS The arts are for everyone to create and to enjoy. The Washington Center for the Performing Arts’s Young Arts Ambassadors are learning about the arts from the inside out, and they’ll share their knowledge and creations at a showcase this Saturday. A benefit for the program, the showcase features …
by Kelli Samson for OLY ARTS Evergreen State College alumna Amy Shephard has collaborated with Andrew Gordon and Daven Tillinghast to write Olympia Family Theater’s final show of its 11th season, Fishnapped! “It’s an interactive, musical mystery involving a missing goldfish,” says Shephard, who also choreographs the production. The musical numbers, composed by Tillinghast, are …
by Christian Carvajal for OLY ARTS Led by Jerry Berebitsky, Olympia Waldorf School has accepted the challenge of portraying a flock—technically, an “ostentation”—of peacocks. That includes at least 30 kid-sized peacock characters and an alpha peacock some 24 feet high, puppeteered by 20 people. The original alpha puppet was created by the Spirit of the …
by Christian Carvajal for OLY ARTS Since 1974, the Nisqually river delta has been set aside for public enjoyment as the Billy Frank Jr. Nisqually National Wildlife Refuge. This biologically diverse estuary covers over 760 acres, the largest delta refuge in the Pacific Northwest. It’s a birdwatcher’s delight, with over 200 species alighting there each …
by Christian Carvajal for OLY ARTS “Who can take a sunrise / Sprinkle it in dew?” We suspect any child of the 1970s, or of any decade since for that matter, could immediately answer that musical question. It’s “The Candy Man,” of course—in this case, a very specific candy man, the mischievous (and ostensibly homicidal) …