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'Dinosaurs' takes you for a walk on the wild side

By Kevin Cowherd | Sun Reporter

April 30, 2008

If you liked the Jurassic Park movies but long for a more intimate look at dinosaurs stomping around in a bad mood, this could be your big chance.

Starting tonight, Walking With Dinosaurs - The Live Experience kicks off the first of nine performances at 1st Mariner Arena, having played to mostly glowing reviews since opening in July.

The $20 million show, based on the award-winning BBC television series, features 15 "live" dinosaurs, snarling fight scenes, lush scenery, erupting volcanos and a massive comet that slams into Earth and signals the end of the species.

"It's a live theatrical experience, it's not an exhibit," resident director Cameron Wenn said yesterday. "It chronicles the history of dinosaurs and their evolution and ultimate extinction. It spans 170 million years in about 100 minutes."

The larger dinosaurs, Wenn explained, are "animatronic puppets" operated by three people, including a driver hidden in the floor who maneuvers the beast around the arena.

The smaller dinosaurs, such as Baby-T, a 15-foot-long Tyrannosaurus rex toddler, are called "suit" dinosaurs and are operated by a performer inside.

At the Maryland Science Center yesterday, some 1,500 schoolchildren on field trips and a throng of media were treated to a brief preview of the show.

Chad Colton, 28, a performer from L.A. who has been with the show since last year, appeared in the Baby-T suit and snarled at the crowd for five minutes.

"It essentially operates like a big battle robot in those Japanese cartoons," Colton said of the suit. "You're strapped in by a hip belt ... , and a control rod allows you to work the head and upper body, close the eyes, and so on."

Colton said that, as a kid, he was fascinated with dinosaurs and considers performing in the show a "dream job."

"But my third-grade teacher found out what I do and sent me an e-mail that said, 'I'm so disappointed in you,'" he said with a laugh. "But she put LOL at the end of it."

What sets this version of Walking With Dinosaurs apart, said Wenn, is the sheer enormity of the dinosaurs and the closeness of the audience.

"No one's ever done anything like this before," he said. "It's on a scale that's awesome - the dinosaurs themselves are even more awesome in their realism.

"Jurassic Park and the Walking With Dinosaurs BBC series used very high-tech computer graphics to re-create dinosaurs on screen. We've taken that one step further. We've taken dinosaurs out of the two-dimensional world and put them in the same room with you."

kevin.cowherd@baltsun.com

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'Dinosaurs' takes you for a walk on the wild side

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'Dinosaurs' takes you for a walk on the wild side

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