Rishi Ra­goonath

Laugh­ter, gasps and de­light­ed screams filled the au­di­to­ri­um at the South­ern Acad­e­my for the Per­form­ing Arts on March 5, as school­child­ren from across Trinidad and To­ba­go gath­ered to watch the thrilling stage pro­duc­tion of The 7 Voy­ages of Sin­bad.

Pre­sent­ed by Crazy Catholic, DC­Shell The­atre and Cin­don Pro­duc­tions, the live­ly show de­liv­ered com­e­dy, ad­ven­ture, mu­sic and mag­i­cal sto­ry­telling that kept the young au­di­ence en­gaged from be­gin­ning to end. With bound­less en­er­gy and sharp com­ic tim­ing, the tal­ent­ed cast brought the tale to life through colour­ful char­ac­ters, play­ful di­a­logue and ac­tion-packed scenes.

Dra­mat­ic bat­tles, clever jokes and spon­ta­neous mo­ments of hu­mour had the chil­dren clap­ping, cheer­ing and laugh­ing through­out the per­for­mance. The pro­duc­tion is both en­ter­tain­ing and mean­ing­ful, car­ry­ing an im­por­tant mes­sage that courage, kind­ness and team­work can over­come even the great­est chal­lenges.

At the heart of the sto­ry was Sin­bad’s quest to de­feat the sev­en sins trou­bling the world—pride, greed, wrath, en­vy, lust, glut­tony and sloth. In the imag­i­na­tive ad­ven­ture, a Fairy God­moth­er sends the brave sailor on sev­en dar­ing voy­ages around the globe. Ac­com­pa­nied by his loy­al com­pan­ions—Zara the War­rior Princess, Ha­zo the wise old sailor and the mis­chie­vous Rumpel­stilt­skin—Sin­bad trav­els across the con­ti­nents of Asia, Africa, North Amer­i­ca, South Amer­i­ca, Antarc­ti­ca, Eu­rope and Aus­tralia. Along the way, the group must res­cue sev­en princess­es be­ing held cap­tive by sev­en cun­ning vil­lains.

Each voy­age in­tro­duced a new chal­lenge, an­oth­er en­e­my to out­wit and valu­able lessons about brav­ery and friend­ship. The fast-paced jour­ney trans­forms the stage in­to a vi­brant world of ad­ven­ture that cap­ti­vat­ed the young au­di­ence.

The pro­fes­sion­al cast daz­zled in colour­ful cos­tumes de­signed to re­flect the cul­tures of the con­ti­nents vis­it­ed dur­ing the sto­ry. The pro­duc­tion al­so fea­tured live­ly mu­si­cal num­bers, with singers per­form­ing pop­u­lar hits from the 1980s to to­day, prompt­ing many chil­dren to sing along from their seats.

Di­rect­ed by Crazy Catholic, the show al­so in­clud­ed wit­ty ref­er­ences to cur­rent events in Trinidad and To­ba­go and be­yond. Hu­mor­ous men­tions of the To­ba­go radar de­bate, road con­di­tions, un­em­ploy­ment and teach­ers’ wage ne­go­ti­a­tions drew laugh­ter from teach­ers and guardians in the au­di­ence.

Lo­cal mu­sic added even more ex­cite­ment, with songs by Rasi­ka Din­di­al and en­er­getic so­ca tracks by Machel Mon­tano turn­ing the the­atre in­to a joy­ful cel­e­bra­tion of mu­sic, cul­ture and sto­ry­telling.