The Eleanor Drury Children's Theatre presents: Wilde Tales

THUNDER BAY - The Eleanor Drury Children's Theatre is back and the kids are excited to present "Wilde Tales"  a collection of five children's stories written by legendary Irish poet and playwright, Oscar Wilde.

"Oscar Wilde is not traditionally a children's storyteller, but he has five really well-known stories. So I think most people will recognise the base stories that are contained in it," said director Aleksa Shermack.

"But our youth and our production team worked together to create this adaptation that is basically all of those familiar stories woven into a brand new script."

The show was originally planned to be put on over two years ago but the pandemic forced the theatre company to put that on hold.

"We wrote the script with the expectation that we would be doing it on stage. So, when that didn't happen, we thought, 'this needs to be on stage, the script is made for the stage,' it's made for a live audience, it's not made for film right?" said Shermack.

"So we took a couple of characters from our story and used them to write a film script and actually produced a film during the pandemic."

The Eleanor Drury Children's Theatre's goal is to make a positive impact on the growth of youth and artists in the community through live theatre and the excitement shown in the cast of "Wilde Tales" proves that that goal is right on track.

"When I was in grade five, I came to see Eleanor Drury's production of Alice in Wonderland and I saw this girl on stage, she's actually been in a few of my classes in high school, and i was like wait a minute, she's my age," said Mackenzie Dillon, actor.

"And then when I came home from the theatre, I was like, mom, look this up, I want to be involved, get me on stage. And it wasn't easy at first because you know, hundreds of people are going to see me on stage performing and that's terrifying when you're 11 or 12. It got easier and easier over time."

All ages are welcome and the show runs from April 1 to April 2 at magnus theatre. Tickets can be bought here.