Blending Talents to Show ‘It’s Good to Be an Ant’

The San Francisco Mime Troupe’s multiple Obie Awards (off-Broadway honors) and its 1987 Tony Award for excellence in regional theater attest to the appeal of the company’s touring musical comedies: razor-edged, wild and wacky activist theater pieces on topics ranging from managed health care and racism to feminism, capitalism and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Not the first company that might come to mind to create a children’s play.

The Pasadena Shakespeare Company, known for, well, Shakespeare--it puts on several of the classics each year--isn’t what you’d think of as kids’ entertainment, either.

Unless, that is, you’re Hillary Haft Bucs, public and theater programs coordinator of Kidspace Museum in Pasadena.

Kidspace, which had never staged a children’s production before, decided to go after a grant being offered by the John Anson Ford Theatre to create a collaborative children’s play that would be presented as part of its outdoor summer family series this year.

Bucs immediately approached two companies she knew and admired: the mime troupe because of its improv skills and commedia dell’arte style, and the Pasadena Shakespeare Company for its theatrical expertise.

Her resulting play, “It’s Good to Be an Ant”--created in collaboration with Kidspace director of education and composer-musician Roy Mueller, veteran mime troupe director Dan Chumley and Pasadena Shakespeare Company associate artistic director and actor David Needles--debuts on Saturday at 10 a.m., outdoors at the John Anson Ford Amphitheatre.

Bucs wrote the play, suitable for ages 4 and up, with input from the others, exchanging rewrites and ideas. (Under the grant, only two days of face-to-face time are provided to work out the staging kinks.)

For Bucs, it’s all about educational fun, based on a new Kidspace exhibit: an ant hill--a 17-foot-high structure representing the environment of the leaf cutter ant.

“The children love it,” she said. “[But] they don’t think ‘ant colony’; they think ‘structure,’ so I created a character called ‘Queen Ant’ who comes out at random in costume. I ask children to help me find food, take care of my eggs and help with the colony.”

Mueller suggested the play reflect the exhibit, and Bucs imagined a tale about some disgruntled worker ants, a “sneaky wood louse” with a taste for ant eggs, and a brave ant queen to teach children “about the social aspects of an ant colony.”

Broad commedia dell’arte-style characters and loads of audience participation--volunteers will be onstage the whole time; others will participate from their seats--are planned to make the learning fun.

“It’s going to be very interesting the way this all comes together,” said Needles, who plays the Soldier Ant and will co-direct with Chumley. “Hillary’s scripting the scenario but leaving it somewhat loose so that the San Francisco Mime Troupe can use their abilities to improvise, based on the characters we develop, and then give us the opportunity to work with the [audience] in a spontaneous way, so that it’s educational and fun at the same time.”

“We’re going to have such a quick time together, it’s going to challenge our improvisational skills to nail it, but I think we’ll do great,” said Chumley, who will play the “bad guy” wood louse. He’s bringing two other troupe actors along to play ant roles.

Chumley, who’s also directing his company’s current show, “Eating It”--about genetically modified corn that attacks the planet--gives Bucs full credit for a play that combines imaginative storytelling and real life. While he notes that the characters will be comic, however, his carefully considered, sociopolitical analysis of the play is vintage Mime Troupe:

It’s “the myth-metaphor of the ant colony as a way to see society,” he said. “In a world where we emphasize individuality, but we don’t value each person’s contribution--either through minimized wages or the lack of praise--the loss of the ‘we’ has become a very atomized reality.”

Kids need to have a sense that they’re “good,” said Chumley, who does regular outreach work with youth groups. “That what you can [contribute] may be a small thing, but it’s a good thing; it’s necessary. So I think that’s a very good message and a worthy piece to make.”

BE THERE

“It’s Good to Be an Ant,” John Anson Ford Amphitheatre, 2580 Cahuenga Blvd. East, Hollywood, Saturday at 10 a.m.; craft activities at 9 a.m. $7. (323) 461-3673. The play also will be performed Aug. 20 at the Arboretum in Arcadia, but without the San Francisco Mime Troupe. (626) 821-3222.