Adapted and originally directed by Katie Mitchell. Directed by Carole Higgins. A Carousel Theatre production. At the Waterfront Theatre on Sunday, February 26. Continues until March 26

Mischief, mayhem, and meow: this lively and colourful adaptation of the Dr. Seuss classic has all the ingredients to offer a safe taste of anarchy to its young audience.

If you haven’t been a child or read to one in the past 60 years, here’s a brief synopsis: a boy and his sister Sally have been left home alone by their mother, with no one but their pet fish for company. It’s raining, and they’re bored, until a bump announces the arrival of the Cat in the Hat, who—along with his friends, Thing One and Thing Two—unleashes chaos and makes a huge mess in their house, all in the name of “fun that is funny”.

Katie Mitchell’s adaptation, originally produced by the National Theatre of Great Britain, complements Seuss’s simple, rhymed text with lots of physicality, and director Carole Higgins and her cast do an excellent job of fine-tuning the characters’ synchronized movements and exaggerated gestures. A lot of the action is presented through the reactions of Mack Gordon’s Boy and Lauren Jackson’s Sally as their wide eyes and craned necks trace the trajectory of the Cat’s high jinks. Gordon and Jackson are exquisitely bewildered narrators of their adventures. Mike Stack’s Cat exudes mischievous delight from hat to tail, with plenty of knowing looks and proud tricks in between. Kayvon Khoshkam’s buttoned-down Fish, the story’s advocate for order, is his hilarious foil, and Nicol Spinola and Amanda Testini, as Thing One and Thing Two, run back and forth breaking things at such velocity that the fluffy hairs of their blue fright wigs are visibly blown back.

This is grand chaos, minimalistically and inventively staged. Vicki Mortimer’s modular set and props combine in ingenious ways to reproduce Dr. Seuss’s illustrations with precision. Drew Facey’s costumes are also spot-on; his wittiest touch is to put Khoshkam’s Fish in a sharp business suit. Paul Clark’s jazzy music matches the show’s playful mood.

All the frenzy is offered up at a pace slow enough for the very young (the production is recommended for ages three to eight) to savour. And as a bonus, every show features a brief talkback with the actors, so curious kids can learn some behind-the-scenes secrets.