Kids Get the Message

“Animal Talk,” a musical play in a TV talk-show setting--featuring a Persian cat named Catty Lee as host--was created by entertainment professionals for the HOLA Youth Theatre. Though less professional in execution, it gives its audience plenty to think about.

This earnest mix of entertainment and education, presented at Immanuel Presbyterian Church by adults and children, puts a kid-size spin on respecting the importance and the interdependence of all life.

The show opens with a relationship problem between Tanya (Wenona Hoag) and her neglected dog, Sparky (Johnny Martinez). Catty Lee (Rena Wolf) takes audience suggestions--”More dog biscuits,” “Take him for a walk,” “Scratch his belly”--and then it’s on to a make-over with celebrity hairstylist Poo-dell Sissoon (Wilfrid Hyde Black), a cooking segment with Batsy Belfry (Annmarie Hehir) and a musical moment with South American star Amazonia Parrotina (Deborah Meier).

Written by Melanie MacQueen, with music by David Coleman, who also directs, the play has a message to impart in every segment: Tanya learns that a pet is a living thing to care for and respect; Poo-dell Sissoon, whose idea of high fashion is to “make over” every one in his own poodle image, flops with Ms. Toad (Renee Arambel), who’s happy to be her own warty self.

It also turns out that Batsy Belfry doesn’t cook, and she doesn’t suck blood either. Insects are her sustenance, as they are for the majority of the world’s very necessary bats, we’re told.

Amazonia Parrotina sings about the “web of life” and the connectedness of nature and about what happens when a strand of that web is broken.

Learning is also the aim of videotaped “commercials” that parody consumerism (“Giant Co.: Buy It or Else”), and Catty Lee’s co-host, Milton Spider (Dennis Strickland), gets in wisecracks and some arachnid facts.

Pleasant but uneven, with a community theater feel, the worthy show ends after some unscrupulous businessmen and the Giant Co. sponsor (David Van Antwerp) storm the stage to steal the seeds of the last living “JoyJoy Tree.” It seems the greedy trio wants the seeds for the manufacture of fabulously expensive wrinkle cream. The animals, however, band together to foil their plan.

Coleman’s songs with a pop beat are tuneful and often expressive; the show’s variable timing, however, isn’t helped by the fact that everything comes to a standstill for the commercial breaks, as a movie screen is slowly lowered for the screening of each video.

It isn’t certain either, that younger children will comprehend the “commercials” as parody. One in particular is simply a series of dramatic explosions, car and helicopter crashes that advertise a fictional movie called “Kabloom!”

Similar confusion exists in a scene with Rodrigo de Toro (Steve Ochoa) and Rico Loco (William Vega) and their message about the cruelty of the “sports” of bull- and cockfighting. Although the two young actors do a standout job in the roles, MacQueen’s script leaves some room for doubt in the rooster’s emphatic defense of his bloody occupation as being about “honor and glory.”

Kelly Wright’s set, including a giant web for Milton Spider, is limited but assured and colorful.

The cast credits given here are for the mixed cast of adult professionals and youth actors who play the roles on Saturday; mostly youth actors perform on Sundays.

BE THERE

“Animal Talk,” HOLA Youth Theatre, Immanuel Presbyterian Church, Parish Hall, 3300 Wilshire Blvd., Los Angeles, Saturdays, 2 p.m.; Sundays, 5 p.m. $5 (under age 13) and $7. Ends Aug. 30. (213) 385-5515. Running time: 50 minutes.