December 8, 2023
This beautiful story has endured for 80 years in the imaginations of young and old alike, and I’m so grateful you’ve joined us to be part of our retelling of it. Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s book is exquisite, yet there’s something especially powerful about telling this story in the theatre, where we get to experience in real time what Fox means when he says “the thing that is essential is invisible to the eye.” For me, the invisible communion of audience and storyteller is very much a part of what is essential--the human connection and collective witnessing we are about to do here are transformative acts.
I think many of us can sympathize with what the Aviator means by feeling misunderstood. What happens when we realize that we are the grown-ups? Everyone becomes that eventually, if we’re lucky. What does it mean, then, that “grown-up” is so often synonymous with compromise, with burden, with not being able to hear the music any more?
What does it take to pull us out of the desert and allow the music to reach us? I think we all can find our own version of The Little Prince appearing and reminding us who we are. Maybe it’s in a sunset, maybe it’s in a piece of art that moves you, maybe it’s in a connection with another person. This holiday season, no matter how you celebrate moving from the darkness into the light, I hope you are able to connect to the part of yourself that can always hear the music, and I hope that we, in telling this story with you and for you, are one small reminder that in fact, you could hear it all along.