Windward Community College is stretching its developing theatrical muscles this week with a children's production of "James and the Giant Peach." The production features original music and includes performances both at the campus Paliku Theatre and a road trip to the Hawai'i Theatre in downtown Honolulu.

Adapted for the stage by Richard George, the play is based on a children's book by Roald Dahl, who also wrote "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory."

The result is large and colorful, with a few bold strokes that give the production its most interesting moments.

James (Kuamu Pelekai) escapes an orphaned "Cinderella" existence by escaping in a giant fruit grown, "Beanstalk" style, from seeds offered by an old man. The fun begins when he crawls inside the giant peach, finds it populated by friendly anthropomorphic insects, and accidentally sets off on a journey across the Atlantic Ocean.

Understandably, special effects and costuming become the production's strong suits.

The dominant stage piece, designed by Alexia Hsin Chen, resembles a peach-shaped diving bell that the actors muscle around a largely bare playing area as the crew bobs along ocean currents before hitching a ride on a flock of seagulls.

Another effective device is a peach-shaped screen, filled with images produced by rear-projection shadow puppets. Here we see James' parents meet their death from a rampaging rhinoceros and track the crew during their adventurous journey.

The device is a wonderful way to stimulate audience imaginations and economically supply special effects. One wishes only that the images were larger and used more often.

Other puppetlike devices designed by Kat Pleviak add to the visual mix. A school of shark fins circle the floating peach, snaking around on skateboards paddled by black-clad stage hands. A huge winged creature swoops across the stage and is gone. A coiled glow-worm sock puppet speaks in a strangely familiar Island accent.

Evette Tanouye's insect costumes add a big production punch, effectively suggesting a Centipede covered with rubber slipper soles to represent its many feet, a six-legged Spider, and a cone-headed Earthworm.

Kris Fitzgerald directs an outgoing cast of current and former WCC students, while Lisa Marinacci supplies the original songs and incidental music.