In the spring of 2013, The 5th Avenue Theatre’s educational touring company, Adventure Musical Theater, will take the stage at schools across Washington State, presenting the original musical, “It Happened at the World’s Fair!”

Reaching 48,000 students a year, AMT brings full-scale productions of original, curriculum-based musicals directly into the schools, providing many children with their very first live theater experiences.

“Every child deserves to see great theater, because great theater can really bring a topic to life.” said 5th Avenue Theatre Producing Director Bill Berry.  “Some students can sit in a classroom all day long and never understand what the World’s Fair in 1962 was all about. But we bring the show to them and suddenly they get it. And that’s true with all of our AMT shows. This is their entry into a world they might never see otherwise.”

“It Happened at the World’s Fair!” is a journey filled with spirited music and witty lyrics by Seattle’s own Richard Gray. The production follows the adventures of two modern sixth graders who step out of an elevator in Seattle Center and find themselves transported to 1962. In this Seattle, the Space Needle is completely orange and Elvis is The King.

Over the course of the show, students are introduced to an exciting time in history, taught the importance of appreciating the past, and reminded of the impact that the 1962 Seattle World’s Fair had on the Pacific Northwest.

Beyond entertaining children for the last 18 years, Adventure Musical Theater seeks to educate and inspire students as it introduces them to the magic of musical theater. The company also provides schools with study guides that explore the show’s themes through fun classroom activities. Every performance is followed by a question-and-answer session led by the actors.

The farthest distance travelled to a single school was 286 miles to St. Thomas More in Spokane, and other stops included schools as far north as Lynden, Washington, and as far south as Tualatin, Oregon. No school is too remote, and no school is turned away because of its inability to pay.

AMT’s “It Happened at the World’s Fair!” is accepting bookings through November 30 for Spring of 2013. For bookings and information, please contact Orlando Morales at omorales@5thavenue.org.