If you live in the Milwaukee area and you have kids, you likely have been Facebook stalked with the Very Hungry Caterpillar Show ads from First Stage. I had been seeing the ads for weeks before I finally gave in and clicked through. Upon looking into it a little bit, the show actually looked super cute. And to my surprise, tickets were only $14 for general admission so I took a chance and bought three tickets.
If you aren’t familiar with the show, this is the description that they provide on the First Stage website – and it’s pretty spot on.
Four timeless stories and 75 magical puppets bring Eric Carle’s iconic creatures to life. This colorful stage production faithfully adapts four of Carle’s beloved stories, The Artist Who Painted a Blue Horse, Mister Seahorse, The Very Lonely Firefly and of course, the star of the show – The Very Hungry Caterpillar. Rated “five smiles” by Newsday and “bedazzling” by The New York Times, experience this larger-than-life world of Carle’s charming classics.
The show is approximately 55 minutes, with no intermission and it’s recommended for families with young people ages 3-7.
When you buy tickets to the show they are “general admission” so we really didn’t know what to expect by that. I wanted to make sure that we got a decent seat so we got there a little early. I’m glad we did because when we walked in there were risers that had about 50 chairs on the top couple rows and then a some rows open for seating on the floor. We grabbed a seat on the bottom riser and it worked out perfectly! There were clearly some veteran First Stage-goers because they brought blankets to put on the risers and a card game to play with the kids while they waited for the show to start. I definitely noted this for future reference!
About 5 minutes before the show – just as the kids were starting to get a bit restless – some of the young actors from the show came out to read the kids the different stories from the show. It was a pretty awesome way to make the wait time go quickly.
The show itself was beyond adorable and absolutely perfect for kids Noah’s age. Each of the four stories was about 10-15 minutes and held Noah’s attention perfectly (which is hard to do!). The different colors, animals and songs were fun and engaging!
They don’t allow you to take any photos during the show but they do a puppet call back for a few minutes after the show so the audience can snap some photos of the puppets.
Overall, the show could not have been better! It’s running now until November 4th. I would highly recommend anyone with kiddos 3-7 years old check it out. You won’t be disappointed in this one.
