When I was a kid, my parents took me to see The Nutcracker every year. My mom likes to say the first time I saw it, I was in her belly.
When I was 3, we got to sit in the front row (I’m sure they were comp tickets from my dad’s job or something). Just as the ballet is getting going and the small wooden nutcracker has turned into a man, my little high-pitched voice said:
“Mommy, you can see right where their penises are!”
To be fair, if you’ve ever been to a ballet, you know I’m not wrong. I was also learning all about anatomy at that time, so it was on my mind.
When I got tickets to the Lion King at the Aronoff Center, my first thought was to bring my almost 2-year-old, and my second thought was if he would say something inappropriate very loudly, as I did. He’s got four older siblings, so he’s heard some stuff, to put it nicely.
Not that I ever want to ruin a show for anyone – if he had started yelling or crying, we’d have left.
But I figured it would be fun to watch him experience something like that at such a young age, and my plan was to observe his reactions and write them down.
Imagine my surprise when the show started, and the only reference I had was the animated movie that had a puffy case for the VHS tape.
I basically forgot about him most of the show. I have goosebumps now just thinking about it. The costumes were so lifelike and moved with the performers’ bodies in a way that allowed you to very quickly forget there wasn’t an actual lion or hyena on stage.
My absolute favorite was Pumbaa, whose rear end moved up and down as he talked in a way that exactly mirrored the original animated movie. And don’t get me started on the number of times I caught myself saying the lines under my breath — it is such a sweet nostalgia for us 80s kids to include exact lines from the original.
But you’re not here to learn what I thought. You are here to learn what my kid thought. Wolfgang is almost 2, and he’s a tiny little old man. He loves to say hi and give high fives, and nothing makes him shy.
To my delight, he made the people around us laugh several times, and the teen girl sitting next to me mostly watched him watch it.
(Scroll down for tips if you’re bringing your youngin’ to the Aronoff!)
Here are the cutest things he said. And no, he didn’t say anything inappropriate, but you know I’d have told you if he did.
“Twinkle twinkle!” Wolf’s favorite song is Twinkle Twinkle, Little Star. As soon as we walked into the auditorium, he looked up to see lights covering the entire ceiling. Basically, he was calling them stars and I thought it was adorable.
“It’s dark! Be quiet!” Ironically, he did not say this quietly at all. This came out as soon as the lights went down, but the show was so fun to watch that he was entertained (and mostly quiet) after that.
“Trouble!” This was when Scar was in front of the elephant graveyard, and Wolf timed it perfectly so everyone could hear. The fact that this show is so good that an almost 2-year-old can understand what’s happening to that extent is pretty amazing if you ask me.
“No lion!” Just as everyone was crying after Mufasa died, Wolf echoed everyone’s thoughts. It even got a few smiles out of those around us.
“Bye Lion, bye!” Right before the lights came up for intermission, but before the quiet faded, he belted this one out, much to the delight of everyone around us. We may have even had the entire theater chuckling (it was needed to clear up all the tears!).
“More lion!” During intermission, he gave me his lollypop (I brought a whole bag to keep him occupied), said “no more lollypop,” and then asked for more lions. Anything that keeps a kid occupied enough that you don’t need snacks is impressive in my book.
Throughout the show, characters come up and down the aisles, making you feel completely immersed in the Lion King world. After one of those scenes, Wolf said, “more boys right there, mom?” He was quite into feeling like he was part of the show.
Just as the show was wrapping up, we clapped for the standing ovation, Wolf’s voice got really loud for pretty much the only time all night: ‘MORE SIMBA!”
Pro tips when taking your toddler to see a show at the Aronoff:
- You have to have a ticket for everyone, but what isn’t advertised is the lap seats. Depending on the show, there is a charge for that ticket, but it’s much lower than a full-price one. Plus, you know, toddlers just fall in between the seat and seatback if they have their own chair anyway.
- Get them dressed up and make them feel important. It makes them want to act grown-up.
- Bring snacks. Quiet ones. I had a whole bag of lollipops, and a sippy cup for the kid (they let you bring them in if they are all plastic, but it can’t have anything in it. Imagine when they told me they needed to check Wolf’s cup, and I took the lid off so they could smell what was in it. That’s not what they meant.)
- If you can, get them a stuffie of one of the characters beforehand. They’ll be stoked to see the character on stage.
- Lastly, look at it through their eyes. Imagine it’s all new and big and exciting, and don’t be so worried about their behavior that nobody ends up having fun (unless they jump on stage and start doing cartwheels or something. That’s a good time to intervene. Or, you know, if they start loudly naming body parts you’d rather they keep to themselves).
