GREENSBORO — On its own, “community theater” still gets boxed in — local casts, familiar scripts, small stages. There’s some truth there, but it misses the larger point. Getting onstage takes guts and a level of nerve most people never test, no matter the venue or the résumé. Everybody starts somewhere.
Anthony Hopkins did, cutting his teeth — pun intended — in YMCA productions long before his role as Hannibal Lecter. Tom Hanks came up through community theater at Sacramento State. Morgan Freeman, Kristin Chenoweth — same story. It’s a starting line, not a ceiling.
Now shrink that stage down to kids. The ask gets bigger.
On Sunday, the Community Theatre of Greensboro filled a room with parents, siblings and grandparents — the kind of crowd that leans forward a little more, claps a little louder. The payoff was “Seussical Jr.,” a bright, fast-moving trip through Dr. Seuss that doesn’t sit still for long.
I took my 6-year-old twins without hesitation. I am also tragically sentimental and still get weepy when I read “Oh, the Places You’ll Go!” My love for most things Seussian is boundless.
“Seussical Jr.” leans all the way into the chaos — bright, busy and packed with just about every Dr. Seuss character you remember.
The show, from Tony winners Lynn Ahrens and Stephen Flaherty (“Lucky Stiff,” “My Favorite Year,” “Once on This Island,” “Ragtime”), pulls Horton the Elephant, the Cat in the Hat, Gertrude McFuzz, Mayzie La Bird and Jojo — a kid with an overactive imagination — into one fast-moving story.
It jumps from the Jungle of Nool to Circus McGurkus and into the tiny, invisible world of the Whos without slowing down.
At the center is Horton, who hears a whole world on a speck of dust. That includes Jojo, a Who sent off to military school for thinking too many “thinks.” Horton ends up juggling two problems at once: protecting the Whos from people who don’t believe they exist and babysitting an abandoned egg Mayzie leaves behind.
There’s ridicule, danger, a kidnapping and even a courtroom moment, but Gertrude McFuzz sticks with him the whole way.
Underneath all the color and noise, it lands where you’d expect — friendship, loyalty and community win out.
Eliza Lee, an eighth grader, shines as the Cat in the Hat, keeping things moving. Emerson Kluttz, a standout fourth grader with confidence and talent beyond her years, anchors the story as Jojo — a kid whose imagination brings trouble at every turn — and never loses the thread.
Joey Volpe, a 12-year-old seventh grader, carries the emotional weight as Horton, balancing a world on a speck while guarding Mayzie La Bird’s abandoned egg, with Sadie Spencer leaning into Mayzie’s carefree chaos. Andia Kajana’s Gertrude McFuzz sticks by Horton the whole way, steady and sincere.
Around them, the world fills out quickly. Elliott Shalhoub and Ayumi Camara — both third graders — take on Mr. and Mrs. Mayor, a reminder of just how young some of this cast is. Maya Coleman’s Sour Kangaroo brings a slight edge, backed by Parker Newman as the Young Kangaroo. Samuel Strader’s Vlad Vladikoff, Cash Czachor’s Judge Yertle the Turtle and Emmanuel Smith’s Grinch round out a cast that rarely lets the pace dip.
The Bird Girls — Elizabeth Gibson, Harper Johnson, Kylee Rodriguez-Harris and Sydney Swaringen — and the Wickersham Brothers — Amiyah Spinks, Keller Pearce and Lillian McHone — keep the stage busy, supported by an ensemble of young actors that accentuates the point. Among them is Bishop Brown, a first grader making her debut with CTG, the kind of wide-eyed, all-in presence that captures what this level of theater is really about.
For the kids onstage, it’s more than costumes and lines. It’s timing, nerves and figuring it out in real time with a crowd watching.
That’s the point people miss about community theater.
It’s not where you end up. It’s where you start.
“Who” knows? Somewhere in that cast might be the next Laurence Olivier or Meryl Streep — or just a kid finding their footing for the first time.
