The Incredible Adventures of Mary Jane Mosquito

PRESENTED BY

Carousel Players

A hands-on puppet building workshop followed by an interactive presentation with music and puppets of The Incredible Adventures of Mary Jane Mosquito by Tomson Highway.

Audience participants will build their own small puppet in the first 15 minutes, and then use their puppet at points in the presentation.

This musical play for young children is about little Mary Jane Mosquito, who was born without wings and has always felt like an outsider. She is teased and ostracized by her peers. She is sent away to school, and then to live with her auntie in the city. Eventually, Mary Jane finds her voice through song and learns to make friends. The play explores themes of feeling like an outsider, dealing with bullying, moving to a new place, and feeling different from the rest of the pack.

This is a multi-lingual work: presented primarily in English, the characters sometimes speak to the audience in French, and playwright Thomson Highway has also woven in Cree language that is taught to the audience through playful interaction. The result is an inclusive presentation that celebrates tolerance and understanding. The audience follows this little wingless mosquito’s journey, as Mary Jane discovers that her true gift is singing, and that she can make friends wherever she goes by sharing her songs, her Cree language, and by being kind to others.

The songs that Highway has created for this show are rhythmically sophisticated with delightful melodies that children are encouraged to sing along to. Mary Jane performs these musical numbers in a kid-made-cabaret style, accompanied by her good friend Samba Cheese on the piano. The other characters that surround Mary Jane are portrayed by puppets created especially for this production.