What makes Shrek the Musical special?
I love musicals. The joyfulness of music, the cleverness of the lyrics, the dancing, the costumes — what’s not to love?
Flying Arrow’s production of Shrek was just that, loveable.
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We have so many hidden talents in our community and this was an amazing way to showcase them.
I also commend the members of the society for choosing Shrek.
There are so many layers to this production. If all you want to do is laugh at fart jokes, you can.
If you wanted to take home a lesson about finding true love instead of fulfilling an obligation that comes from a story book, you can.
You could also learn a lesson about accepting what is special about yourself instead of conforming to what might be considered “perfect.”
Friendship and relationships with others are an ongoing theme in the production.
But there is also the opportunity to talk about confidence and self love. Fiona says something along the lines of “who could love a monster?”
When Shrek overhears this, he walks away, thinking she is talking about him.
If you dive deeper, you can look at how family and community impacts who Shrek and Fiona feel about themselves.
Both were forced to leave home at seven years old, in the musical anyway.
Fiona spent her life living alone in a tower. Young Shrek was driven away by the villagers, and decided he was better off alone.
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Along those lines, there are themes of fear of the different.
Shrek is someone different and, without bothering to understand him, the community is scared of him and persecutes him.
The other fairy tale creatures are also targeted because of their differences and banished from “perfect” society.
If you were looking for an example to explain about racism, xenophobia, self love and many, many other things, you may want to use Shrek as an example. Remember how the villagers threatened Shrek with pitch forks when he didn’t do anything wrong?
Sometimes that is what happens to some people who move to Canada from other countries and have different skin colours, or speak different languages.
Or, you can just enjoy the spectacle, the silliness, the magic. Not everything has to be a lesson.
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