Review: 'No More Dead Dogs' by Griffin Theatre; 'Dot and Ziggy' by Chicago Children's Theatre
"No More Dead Dogs" ★★½ Through June 19 at Theater Wit, 1229 W. Belmont Ave.; $22-$30 at 773-975-8150 or theaterwit.org
If a kid in school picks up a book — “Old Yeller,” say, or “Where the Red Fern Grows” — and sees a dog smiling away on the front cover, it's a pretty good bet that, by the final chapter, the pooch in question will be munching Milk-Bones in the sky. The canine life expectancy in young adult literature is roughly comparable to that of a lead held by the Bulls in a playoff game.
In Gordon Korman's book “No More Dead Dogs,” now adapted for the stage by William Massolia of the Griffin Theatre Company, a high school kid named Wallace (the dry Ryan Lempka) decides that he has had enough of dogs being killed off in service of prepubescent tears. And thus he sets out to express this truth in a report written for his teacher, Mr. Fogelman (Jeremy Fisher, who could dial it back a tad). Unfortunately for Wallace, the book “Old Shep, My Pal” happens to be one of his teacher's favorites — and to the chagrin of his pals, Wallace finds himself in detention and off the football team, which needs him. A lesson ensues in how the truth, while desirable in most circumstances, sometimes requires shading.
If you have a kid between about 8 and 13, you'll likely have fun together at director Dorothy Milne's lively production (although Massolia's adaptation badly needs a clip and a trim; if this were “Old Yeller,” we'd be good and ready for the critter to croak). Unlike a lot of shows aimed at kids, this one teaches what you might call relative thinking — its message is that it's never a bad idea to challenge a cultural work that's being pushed on you, or how your emotions are being manipulated. That's the kind of armor that one does not easily acquire from Nickelodeon or the Disney Channel, and it gets more useful every day.