"Balloonacy" Crosses Many Barriers

Barry Kornhauser never imagined that his wordless little play about a red balloon would resonate with autistic children.

Kornhauser, who is assistant director of Campus and Community Engagement at Millersville’s Ware Center, wrote the play “Balloonacy” several years ago. It was targeted for very young children from two to five years old.

“I created the play for preschoolers, working with non-English speaking Hmong and Somali refugees at several day care centers, with deaf children in Washington, D.C., and on an urban reservation in Minneapolis with a group of Native American youngsters in an Ojibwe immersion school,” he says.

The challenge was to come up with a playful, imaginative story that youngsters who did not speak English or could not hear would enjoy. “Balloonacy” was meant to cross language barriers, so that kids from Somalia, inner city Washington or France could all appreciate the story. It went on to win the Distinguished Play Award of the American Alliance for Theater & Education.

“Balloonacy” has been performed at more than a dozen theatres, in cities across the U.S. It was at Dallas Children’s Theater, where Kornhauser discovered that his two-character play had touched the heart of a young boy named Daniel. Daniel is on the autism spectrum and cannot always relate and empathize with other people. When his father Troy took Daniel to see “Balloonacy,” he was thrilled to find that Daniel related to the balloon and to the old man in the play.

So touched by the effect of “Balloonacy” on his son, Troy created his own whimsical video on his son’s experience at the play. As he noted, “Daniel was utterly delighted with the red balloon,” which his father expected, since autistic children tend to relate better to objects than to people. The wonderful surprise was when Daniel began to emphasize with the old man, who had lost the red balloon. When the old man cried, Daniel cried. He felt the old man’s emotion. “This is major,” said his father. “He felt sad for the old man.”

“I never expected this when I wrote “Balloonacy,” but it is wonderful to hear this,” says Kornhauser, who was commissioned by The Children’s Theatre in Minneapolis. “It’s a story that resonates with all children in its simplicity of a friendship between a lonely old man and a balloon that he first finds annoying.”

Daniel’s wordless review of “Balloonacy” echoes the reviews of critics who have seen Kornhauser’s Chaplin-esque play noting that “its mix of puppetry, wordless situational comedy and physical humor is a winning combination.  It offers a sterling and humorous experience for preschoolers and parents alike – and the ages in-between, should they not be turned off by the ‘children’s’ label.  Some things are too good to pass up.”

“There are no words spoken aloud in this play; all the communication comes through movement, expression, and body language,” reported the Twin Cities Daily Planet. Pioneer Press called “Balloonacy:  Short, simple, silly – and superb,” adding that actor “Robert Dorfman plays into and off of the excited reactions of the wee ones assembled on the floor before him, his face saying everything you need to know.”

Sometimes it is the simplest story that captures the imagination best. “Balloonacy” runs for just about a half hour. There are no words. There are two characters, the old man and a magical red balloon that in turn irritates and charms the man. As Kornhauser points out, casting the badly behaved red balloon is the hard part. “You usually have several red balloons on hand, all made of plastic and with just the right amount of helium, so they won’t float away.”

“I was not thinking about how the piece would play to children on the autism spectrum, but this little video addresses that.  It’s both charming and very interesting,” says Kornhauser. “It means a lot to me to know that children like Daniel have been so touched by this play.”

To see Daniel and Troy’s video on Barry Kornhauser’s “Balloonacy,” click on:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XPOBA34HVn4&feature=youtu.be