Should I Share My Ice Cream? by Mo Willems

KLOSSEN: For us to be able to be part of a brand-new world premiere opera was very exciting.

GOMEZ SARMIENTO: That's Betsy Klossen, who attended the show with her nieces. UNIDENTIFIED MUSICAL GROUP: (Singing, inaudible).īETSY KLOSSEN: I think the most fun thing was when we actually got to sing and tell the pigeon, no, no, no, no, no. UNIDENTIFIED GROUP: So can we stay up late? One way to do that is to address the audience directly. GOMEZ SARMIENTO: Both Willems and Fleming stressed that they really wanted kids and parents to have fun. There are comedies in opera, but they haven't really been in my repertoire so much. We're not used to laughter at all, really. RENEE FLEMING: Well, we're definitely not used to this laughter. It was written in collaboration with singer Renee Fleming. GOMEZ SARMIENTO: The performance, titled 'The Ice Cream Truck Is Broken! & Other Emotional Arias,' premiered over the weekend. UNIDENTIFIED MUSICAL ARTIST #4: (Singing) The ice cream truck's broken.

UNIDENTIFIED MUSICAL ARTIST #3: (Singing, inaudible). UNIDENTIFIED MUSICAL ARTIST #2: (Singing) Knuffle bunny, my number one-y (ph), since I was one-y. And then I discovered that opera and picture books are both about very big emotions. WILLEMS: I know nothing about opera, and that made it really compelling. UNIDENTIFIED MUSICAL ARTIST #1: (Singing, inaudible). Twenty years on, Willems has taken The Pigeon to school, to ride a roller coaster and, now, to the opera. GOMEZ SARMIENTO: 'Don't Let The Pigeon Drive The Bus!' was about a pigeon - last name - Pigeon, first name - The - who asks, begs, demands to get a chance to drive a bus while the driver is on break. The Pigeon showed up one day while I was trying to write a great picture book - this before I had ever been published - and The Pigeon said, don't. He spends years thinking about them, developing them, figuring out the stories they'll be a part of. ISABELLA GOMEZ SARMIENTO, BYLINE: Mo Willems says most of the characters in his children's books are born in an idea garden. As NPR's Isabella Gomez Sarmiento reports, The Pigeon made his operatic debut at Washington's Kennedy Center. But this past weekend, readers got to see and hear a brand-new side of the bossy bird. This month marks 20 years since Mo Willems published his first picture book, 'Don't Let The Pigeon Drive The Bus!' It has sold more than 6 million copies and received a Caldecott honor.

Should I Share My Ice Cream? by Mo Willems