‘Pancho Rabbit’ explores an often overlooked part of the immigrant story
At Atlanta’s Center for Puppetry Arts, a brave young rabbit is making a death-defying journey to find his father, guided by a mysterious coyote. The new live puppet adaptation of “Pancho Rabbit and the Coyote: A Migrant Story,” transforms author and illustrator Duncan Tonatiuh’s children’s book for the stage, immersing young audiences in a sweet story that depicts the challenges of migrant life in North America with empathy.
The show is onstage through Oct. 20. Duncan Tonatiuh and playwright and lyricist Jessica Rosa Espinoza, who helped create the Center for Puppetry Arts’ stage adaptation, both joined Lois Reitzes on “City Lights” to discuss the upcoming performance.
Tonatiuh published the original “Pancho Rabbit” book more than 13 years ago, telling the story of a young rabbit who goes on a journey to cross the U.S. border and find his missing father. The book aims to add an empathetic spin on a hot-button political topic.
By turning the characters into animals, Tonatiuh said he hoped the book could “help people get away from their prejudices” and appreciate the shared human experiences and values in the story, such as the pain of missing a family member.
“It’s experience that a lot of children in the United States have, either had border crossing experiences themselves, or have had relatives that have had these experiences,” he said.
Espinoza stumbled across the book on a regular library trip with her young children, and it became an instant hit in her household, chosen repeatedly by her kids as a bedtime story. From perusing the credits in the book, she learned that Tonatiuh hails from the same city that her parents currently live in, and she was able to leverage that connection into a meeting. Today, the fruits of that collaboration will be on display in a creative adaptation of the book at Atlanta’s Center for Puppetry Arts.
More information about the upcoming play can be found here.
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