John Blondell prepares for a final bow at Westmont College with his new adaptation of The Wind in the Willows, coming to the Porter Theatre. The show, says Blondell, who will also direct the production, is a gentle story about home and friendship that he hopes can block some of the ceaseless clamor of the outside world. “The play is full of enchantment and wonder,” he says. “Really lovely during a time when the world is so noisy.”
This production, Blondell’s final at Westmont, focuses on the adventures of the four central woodland friends of Kenneth Grahame’s novel: Mole, Rat, Badger, and Toad. In the Blondell theatrical production style, the representation of the material will be created with a unique brand of stage magic: Besides actors telling the story, the world of the forest around them will come alive with “animators,” ensemble members who manipulate puppets and objects (designed by Yulya Dukhovny) to create the illusion of a forest teeming with life.
“The ensemble of eight animators — they make the world. Snails and butterflies and fish … they populate the world,” says Blondell. “It’s a stylistic mix between theater acting and puppet acting, and a hybrid of storybook quality. There’s a whimsy to the material, but this is a bit more sophisticated. We’re prompting the stimulus of imagination. It’s theater of poetry, theater of minimalism, and theater of imagination.”
Blondell, who retires this year, also notes that The Wind in the Willows is a meditation on the concept of “home.” “This place has been my home for 40 years,” he says, “and now that it’s in a state of transition, it resonates on a more personal level.”
See The Wind in the Willows at the Porter Theatre on the Westmont Campus (955 La Paz Rd.) February 21-22 and February 28-March 2. See westmont.edu/boxoffice.
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