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By Jane Horwitz By Jane Horwitz May 31 at 6:07 PM

An occasional look at family-friendly theater around Washington. (Shows are appropriate for age 4 and older unless noted.)

My Fair Lady and The Sound of Music lit up Broadway in 1956 and 1959, respectively, their scores now permanently enshrined in the American Songbook. The question is, can these musical-theater oldies keep younger audiences enthralled? True, children may have seen the The Sound of Music movie starring Julie Andrews (or 2013s live television version with Carrie Underwood) and perhaps the 1964 My Fair Lady with Audrey Hepburn. But will they enjoy these shows onstage with no close-ups or popcorn?

At Olney Theatre Center, guest director Alan Souza has moved the setting of My Fair Lady from 1912 to 1921, a short but meaningful leap to a time when British women were getting the vote and hemlines were rising. Souza chose Brittany Campbell, a New York-based singer/songwriter/visual artist/actress, to play Eliza Doolittle, the poor Cockney flower seller whose life is transformed by diction lessons with professor Henry Higgins.

Ive directed My Fair Lady before, but not like this, he says. This is like a complete rethinking of it, and [Campbell] is individual in the way that a modern woman is.

Souza hopes that Campbells Eliza will give the arguably bullying and condescending Higgins (Danny Bernardy) a run for his money ... because she is steps ahead of him all the time. And as both a person of color ... and also as a woman, I think thats going to be interesting, especially to kids.

As for the music by Frederick Loewe and book and lyrics by Alan Jay Lerner (based on George Bernard Shaws play Pygmalion), Souza has no worries. The songs are infectious and theyre smart as can be, and if we have them engaged in the story, they may go out hummin the tunes.

Ted Chapin, president of the Rodgers & Hammerstein Organization, echoes that sentiment when it comes to The Sound of Music.

Theres something that gets into the real little kids when they see the show, Chapin says. Whether its Do-Re-Mi or My Favorite Things or So Long, Farewell, without having been written for them, the stuff is written so they can appreciate and take it all in.

Multiple Tony winner Jack OBrien staged this Sound of Music, which began touring in 2015. Two new leads have joined the cast: Nicholas Rodriguez, known to Washington-area theatergoers for star turns in Arena Stage shows, including Carousel and Oklahoma!, will play Captain von Trapp, and Charlotte Maltby is Maria. Chapin has no doubt that the Richard Rodgers tunes his melodies just get to you and Oscar Hammerstein lyrics will win children over fast if they dont already know them.

But what if youngsters have no concept of the pre-World War II period in Europe or why the von Trapp family must escape Austria? Children, Chapin says, will understand that theres something going on thats bothering the parents and making the parents have to make some pretty bold decisions, and that is all theyll need to know.

The Sound of Music: June 13-July 16 at the Kennedy Center, 2700 F St. NW. 202-467-4600. kennedy-center.org. $39-$169.

My Fair Lady June 21-July 23 at Olney Theatre Center, 2001 Olney-Sandy Spring Rd., Olney, Md. 301-924-3400. olneytheatre.org. $33-$80. Recommended for age 10 and older.

The Wizard of Oz at Creative Cauldron

At Creative Cauldron in Falls Church, theyre less than a week away from opening The Wizard of Oz. The small, award-winning company recently garnered two Helen Hayes Awards for its production of the musical Caroline, or Change, and Tiara Whaley, the Maryland native playing Dorothy, won for her supporting role in that show. Creative Cauldron is using the script from the Royal Shakespeare Companys 1987 adaptation of the movie, songs and all.

Matt Conner, a director and composer who creates professional works as well as shows for students at Creative Cauldron, is staging the production. He has to squeeze it into the 92-seat storefront theater.

Each theme that were used to seeing in The Wizard of Oz, were going to take just a little bit of a different angle, because were going to have to fit it into our small space, says Conner, who will use puppetry for the singing crows to harass poor Scarecrow (Alan Naylor).

Creative Cauldron, which offers acting classes for children and puts them in its Learning Theater shows, tried something new for The Wizard of Oz a professional training program for which youngsters had to audition. The 21 teenagers and younger children who made the cut and completed the program are now in the Oz ensemble as Munchkins and Emerald City folk. They will earn educational stipends, says Laura Connors Hull, Creative Cauldrons producing director, which makes the show Helen Hayes-eligible.

Even though we do adult productions, professional productions, she says, in our core we are an educational organization.

Whaley, who began performing as a child, is excited for the young actors.

I can learn from them just as much as they can learn from me, she says. Were really peers at that point.

The Wizard of Oz: June 8-25 at Creative Cauldron at Artspace Falls Church, 410 S. Maple Ave., Falls Church. 703-436-9948. creativecauldron.org. $30 for adults, $15 for children.

Peh-LO-tah at Kennedy Center

Marc Bamuthi Joseph loves soccer with a passion. As a playwright, choreographer, hip-hop poet, performer and educator, Joseph sees elements of art and politics in the sport. And he uses those elements to raise consciousness and to praise the game in his choreopoem Peh-LO-tah, coming to the Kennedy Centers Family Theater. (Pelota means ball in Spanish.)

As a dancer, as a choreographer, when I watch soccer, it looks like a dance to me something like birds in migration, Joseph says. But Peh-LO-tah plumbs the depths as well as the heights, which is why the show is recommended for age 13 and older.

Peh-LO-tah opens with bits of non-graphic audio and video (impressionistic no violence) from the night of Feb. 26, 2012, when Trayvon Martin, a 17-year-old African American, was shot and killed by George Zimmerman in Sanford, Fla. From there, Josephs piece, which he performs with four other actor/singer/dancers, takes audiences on a visionary voyage using soccer as a metaphor for social ills and social change, expressed in poetry, music, movement and words of protest. A recurring theme contrasts running for joy vs. running for your life. The ideas are complex.

Joseph says his goal is to connect folks across cultures. Its to give a sense of what American promise might be if we are inclusive the way this sport that I love is inclusive ... ultimately to revert to a sense of joy and what freedom means, not just in the political sense, but what freedom means in the body.

Even my teenager certainly didnt get every reference, but he got a general understanding, Joseph adds. Its a choreopoem, and so, as with most poetry, we dont necessarily understand every single concept. ... I think in general that its emotionally legible enough that folks get it, teenagers as well.

Peh-LO-tah: June 9 -June 11 at the Kennedy Center, 2700 F St. NW. 202-467-4600. kennedy- center.org. Show is sold out. Recommended for age 13 and older.

ALSO PLAYING OR OPENING SOON

The bells will toll a few days more for Quasimodo and Esmerelda in a new wordless adaptation of Victor Hugos The Hunchback of Notre Dame by Synetic Theater, directed by Paata Tsikurishvili and choreographed by Irina Tsikurishvili. Through June 11 at Synetic Theater, Crystal City, 1800 S. Bell St., Arlington. 866-811-4111. synetictheater.org. $15-$60. Recommended for age 13 and older.

A revival of Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rices 1970 rock opera, Jesus Christ Superstar, directed by Joe Calarco, continues at Signature Theatre, and teens might be enthralled by the edgy take on the New Testament. Through July 2 at Signature Theatre, 4200 Campbell Ave., Arlington. 703-820-9771. sigtheatre.org. $40-$114. Recommended for mature middle-schoolers and older.

Alice falls down a rabbit hole and lands in a crazy world where everyones a rock musician in Wonderland: Alices Rock & Roll Adventure, based on Lewis Carrolls Alice books, adapted by Rachel Rockwell (book and lyrics) and Michael Mahler (music and lyrics), and directed by Kathryn Chase Bryer. June 21-Aug. 13 at Imagination Stage, 4908 Auburn Ave., Bethesda. 301-280-1660. imaginationstage.org. $12-$30. Recommended for age 5 and older.

Junie B. Jones loses her furry mittens and suspects stealers in Junie B. Jones Is Not a Crook, by Allison Gregory, based on the books by Barbara Park and directed by Washington actor Rick Hammerly. June 23-Aug. 14 at Adventure Theatre MTC, 7300 MacArthur Blvd., Glen Echo. 301-634-2270. adventuretheatre-mtc.org. $19.50.

In July, the Kennedy Center will bring in yet another family-friendly classic, Rodgers & Hammersteins The King and I, about British schoolteacher Anna Leonowens, who went to Siam (Thailand) in the 1860s to teach the many children and wives of the king, in a Tony-winning revival directed by Bartlett Sher. July 18-Aug. 20 at the Kennedy Center, 2700 F St. NW. 202-467-4600. kennedy-center.org. $49-$159. Recommended for age 8 and older.

More here:
Musical 'oldies' test their appeal to the young: 'My Fair Lady' and Sound of Music' in DC - Washington Post