IF YOU GOWhat: “Lil Red.”When: 3 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 23, Oct. 30-31 and Nov. 6.Where: Chauncey-Goode Auditorium, Tennessee Temple University, 1815 Union Ave.Admission: $10 adults, $5 children.Phone: 242-5156.Website: www.destinyentertainment.org.SPOOKTACULAR PRICEAdmittance to the Oct. 31 Halloween performance of “Lil Red” will be “pay what you can” for all children in costume, according to director Hope Alexander. “We want as many people to come as are able,” she said.
The world premiere of “Lil Red,” a musical adapted from the fairy tale “Little Red Riding Hood,” will be the first presentation of the Destiny Kids Theatre on Saturday at Tennessee Temple University’s Chauncey-Goode Auditorium.
“It’s a fractured fairy tale, a different take” on the original, said director Hope Alexander, a former West Coast actress and director who now resides in Chattanooga and is artist-in-residence for Destiny Theatre Company.
It is written by Thorin Alexander, the director’s son and also a Chattanooga resident. The music was written for a workshopped version of the play eight years ago and updated by West Coast composer/lyricist Max Kinberg.
In the adapted version, Lil Red is a tomboy, unlike her sister, the refined Lil Pink. In order to make Lil Red more like Lil Pink, Lil’s Red’s mother sends her to Lil Red’s grandmother. Fortunately, Lil Red’s tomboyishness proves to be an asset when she has to extract the grandmother from a hungry wolf who has eaten her.
Despite the grandmother’s protests, Lil Red saves the wolf after he starts choking on the grandmother’s shoe. Her actions prove to be prophetic since Lil Red’s mother and the wolf fall in love, and the wolf agrees to go to a 12-step program for disordered eating.
Although the play has humor, it also has a message for children that is vital in an age of intolerance and bullying, Hope Alexander said.
“It’s about accepting who you are, about parents accepting who their children are,” she said. “We’re all different, and we need to celebrate our differences. Maybe somebody’s difference could save your life.”
The production has a cast of six adults.