Just So Stories

Rudyard Kipling tells folktales of a time period set in the beginning of years when the world was so new. Women had the job of domesticating wild animals, including the Dog, the Horse, the Cow, the Cat and the Husband. Bren Dubay ties five of the stories together in her smooth-flowing dramatization, with a thread that subtly suggests "classics are fun." Each of the five may be presented as a short play. The stories included are How the Camel Got His Hump, How the Rhinoceros Got His Skin, The Sing-Song of Old Man Kangaroo, The Elephant's Child, and The Cat That Walked by Himself. Much of Kipling's original beautifully written prose has been retained by the playwright. The tales in Kipling's Just So Stories have been stretching young imaginations (and some old ones, too) since they were published in 1902. The play lends itself to creative staging and a free play of the imagination by director, cast and technicians. A table becomes a camel, stuffed toys come to life, a primitive elephant's shoe-like nose stretches into the kind of trunk that elephants wear today, and a bi-colored-python-rock-snake slithers around the stage.