Question:

What's a Hat Trick?

three scores in a game
three stories about hats
a new show from Rag & Bone
all of the above!

If you answered (4), all of the above, you are correct! We are thrilled to unveil this new show, based on three books by acclaimed Canadian author Jon Klassen: I Want My Hat Back, This is Not My Hat, and We Found a Hat. Join us for a Zoom performance featuring puppets, poems, songs, stories, and crazy situations that will make even the most serious children laugh out loud.

Thanks to a Canada Council grant, we’ve been able to re-imagine this show for video with six awesome collaborators, including two professional dancers, who will teach some fun steps that will have us all up and moving to some amazing music!

Featuring dancers Nicola Fridgen and Sarah Hopkin from The School of Dance, multi-instrumentalists Russell Levia and Ainsley McNeany, and musicians Patrick Kline (cello) and Rieko Lokker (violin) from 234 Strings (check out their website).

The three books were initially recommended to us by librarians all across Ottawa for our staged reading series, Snippets. And no wonder. Darkly subversive, with deadpan humour, and rising tension that builds to almost scandalous twists at the end, each book also resonates profoundly on universally human (and childish) dilemmas about lying, stealing, injustice, revenge and ultimately, friendship, loyalty, joy and love.

The stories are funny. Actions and visuals belie the words. Audiences know more than the characters. We see the characters deceive themselves and others, but we don’t judge them.

Here are links to descriptions of the books on Indie Bound:

I Want My Hat Back

This is Not My Hat

We Found a Hat

I Want My Hat Back, This Is Not My Hat, and We Found a Hat. Adapted by Kathy MacLellan. From the books by Jon Klassen, illustrated by Jon Klassen. Published by Candlewick Press.

I Want My Hat Back

In I Want My Hat Back, a big bear politely asks other animals if they have seen his hat. The rabbit’s answer is suspicious: "I did not steal a hat." The chase is on, and the bear recovers his hat in a dark but hilarious way.

This is Not My Hat

In This is Not My Hat, a bold and gleeful little fish steals a hat from a much larger fish. He thinks he’ll get away with it—but the big fish opens his eyes. Once again the chase is on, and justice prevails.

We Found a Hat

Finally, in We Found a Hat, two turtles find one hat. “But there is only one hat, and there are two of us.” Will the hat destroy their friendship?

(The photos are from the wonderful whimsical workshop that we did of the stories with stupendous students from The School of Dance.)

Music includes

Finale by Georg Friedrich Händel
Teddy Bears’ Picnic by John Walter Bratton
Some Folks Do & Hard Times by Stephen Foster
Les Sauvages by Jean-Philippe Rameau
Romance by Johann Hummel
Minuet in G by Ludwig van Beethoven