The Syracuse University Drama Department's production of Edward Mast's play "Jungalbook" offers an hour and a quarter of fast-moving, colorful, acrobatic adventure.
It's a thriller: a lively and often funny piece of story-telling based on Rudyard Kipling's tales about a young boy who from infancy is raised in the jungle as part of a wolf pack.
It hasn't been promoted as children's theater, but it's a show that children will enjoy. Not very young ones, perhaps, but from about eight years old.
The playwright's choice of the spelling "Jungalbook" echoes Kipling's own occasional use of phonetic spelling, and it handily distinguishes the play not only from "The Jungle Book" by Kipling but also from various other versions of Kipling's work.
As "Jungalbook" starts, Akela (Chelsea Rolfes), the tough, gray-haired pack leader, decrees that a new-born infant -- whom the other wolves refer to as "meat" -- will be called Mowgli (MO-glee) and raised as one of them.
And so he is, and some 10 years later, an adolescent, highly athletic lad (Christian Leadley) struts out, confident that he is a major player in the affairs of his pack, and in fact of the whole jungle.
Baloo the Bear (Jon Schoss, in a richly developed piece of character acting) is the burly, kindly, pompous sage who loves to teach others -- and loves to hear himself teaching others -- about the Law of the Jungle.
"Never kill for pleasure!" Baloo proclaims. (You know what he means, but in most cases, the jungle animals will have to do some killing if they want the pleasure of eating).
"Never kill man!" "Always return a favor!" And so on.
You can see why the younger jungle creatures like to mock Baloo.
Baloo also poops in the woods, a moment of high hilarity that delighted the opening night audience.
Mostly, though, Baloo tries to persuade Mowgli that he is not a wolf but a human, really not equipped for jungle survival. "You have no fur, no claws, no fangs," Baloo points out.
Mowgli studies his reflection in the river and says, "I'm just different looking."
Mowgli's great enemy is Sherakhan the Tiger (Matt Smith), a tough customer with a shock of orange hair. He ate Mowgli's parents, and figures that Mowgli is his by right.
But Sherakhan's great enemy, and Mowgli's great protector, is Bagheera the Panther (Farasha Baylock), a graceful creature in silken purple garments and long black stockings.
Eventually, of course, Mowgli will have to face his rite of passage, the test that will define his character and solve his basic dilemma: Is he wolf, or human?
I don't want to give away all the plot twists, but as you can perhaps see, the great achievement of director Felix Ivanov and his young cast is to present jungle creatures that have human motivations, human wit and human limitations.
The characterizations are a good deal more complex than those in most beast fables. And while there are teasing suggestions that Kipling's jungle fables illuminate life today, this isn't the kind of play that hammers home a series of lessons.
Elizabeth Gleason's set is a sprawling, high-rising playground structure that fills the stage of the Storch Theatre. Made of metal pipes and struts, it has ramps, ladders, ropes and many levels. It's an invitation to physical action on a grand scale, and that's how this production uses it, often with breathtaking effectiveness.
For example, Kaa the Python (Christopher Pesto) triggers big laughter when he sways up through a trapdoor, looking rather silly. He is never still. He is always slithering into and out of visibility. And he is really a helpful guy -- but you always want to be careful that he hasn't somehow slithered close to you.
Sherakhan always goes to some effort like clambering up ladders to make sure that he makes his appearance on the topmost level. That way he can talk down to the others.
In one enchanting episode that strikes a fresh note in the story, Mowgli meets a spirited playmate. (The credits aren't perfectly clear on this, but I believe it's Monkey, played by Tara Carbone.)
Wordlessly, she invites him to a cartwheel competition, and they wind up doing no-hands cartwheels together. It's all kind of adolescent fun, not quite flirtation. But it comes at a point when Mowgli is beginning to feel the pressure of conflicting identities, and his first real pal seems to be a primate.
When Mowgli first ventures into the city of humans, he frees Hathi the Elephant (Troy Dangerfield), who has been beaten by humans. Hathi sees instantly that Mowgli is not a jungle creature and makes a friendly offer: "Got any enemies? I'll step on 'em for you."
This is a big cast, and no two of Emily Springer's costumes are alike. They consist of bits and pieces of clothing you might see on any city street -- footwear, vests of all kinds, socks, pants, accessories -- but the sum of them is distinctly bizarre. And somehow, without striving for literal exactness, the costumes suggest the look of vultures, hyenas and other animals.