| Description: | Not all fairy tales have happy endings
For a sad but perfect answer to that question, you might want to check out The Princess and the Handmaiden, which opened Thursday at the Lorraine Kimsa Theatre for Young People.
Leslie Arden has written a daffy, deft, largely delightful musical fable, which cries out for something fresh and original in the way of staging. But, alas, Allen MacInnis and his crew have directed and designed it as though they were working on a very oldfashioned children's musical from the 1960s.
No, earlier. When I was 3 years old in 1953, I was taken to something called I Wish I May, and I swear that some of the sight gags, costumes and even performances that I saw on Thursday afternoon were borrowed directly from that.
What a shame. Arden's work is rare enough, both in quality and frequency, that it deserves better than this.
Her riff on the Grimm Brothers' fable, The Goose Girl, features a disgruntled Handmaiden who forces the Princess she serves to |