What is old is new again
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“The Neverending Story” receives a new life
by Steve Dunkelberger
Jan 03, 2008
I had a soft spot for the movie “The NeverEnding Story” when it played in theaters in 1984. I had just returned from a three-year tour in South Korea and saw the film time and again that summer and fall as we settled into our new duty station.
I found it one of those films that had various layers that peel back with each viewing. Sure, it was a tale about a daydreaming boy named Bastian who finds his way to an old book store. There he befriends the owner, who eventually shows the boy a special book. But he is to never read it. So he does, of course, only to find that the book has special powers.
The book not only tells of the world of Fantasia and the destructive force of the “Nothing” that is rolling through the countryside, but it provides a portal between the world of reality and the one of fantasy. The adventuring hero of the film, Atreyu, is called to solve the troubles caused by the Nothing. During a pained point in the journey, Bastian cries out only to then read about how his scream is being heard in the lands of Fantasia.
The parallel stories continue with the boy reading about the adventures in Fantasia and Fantasia periodically getting a glimpse of the real world. Bastian reads about the parallel worlds and realizes the book is describing him and only he can save the fantasy world by become part of the story he is reading. But to do that he must acknowledge that fantasy is reality, something he struggles with in this coming-of-age tale that runs in the vein of “Puff the Magic Dragon” and “Where the Wild Things are.”
I probably watched this film a dozen times before I learned that it was taken from a book, and was actually only an adaptation that covered the first half of the book. The novel’s author, Michael Ende, felt that this adaptation’s content deviated so far from his book that he requested they either halt production or change the name; when they did neither, he sued them and subsequently lost the case. He did succeed in having his name removed from the opening credits although his name does appear in the closing.
So then I got to read all about the adventures in Fantasia well beyond the movie, and that carried me through some boring times as I settled into my new surroundings. It became just another book on my shelf as I got older, however, and was eventually donated to the Lakewood Library’s biannual book sale. The adventures in Fantasia faded into my memory until I saw that the stage version of the show was set to play at a Seattle theater.
The news was like hearing that an old friend was stopping by for dinner.
The play features original music from the Seattle rock band Heart and holds more true to the book than the movie ever did.
The production at Seattle Children’s Theatre has fantastic sets and uses puppetry to recreate a world of fantasy creatures and make-believe lands. Puppet master Douglas Paasch, who lives in Tacoma, was tasked with fleshing out the play’s tiniest and giant-est inhabitants. While the show lacks the flying dragon special affects and the thunderous sounds of a rockbiter strolling through the woods, it has a sense of charm and childhood wonder that makes the tale truer than the movie could hope for.
[Seattle Children’s Theatre, through Jan. 27, 7 p.m. weekdays, 5:30 p.m. weekends, matinee shows Saturday and Sunday at 2 p.m., $17-$33, 201 Thomas St., under the Space Needle at Seattle Center, 206.441.3322, www.sct.org]
