Walking The Tightrope, the most recent production by British playwright Mike Kenny, is ambitious children’s theatre. The story follows a young girl, Esme, who visits her grandfather soon after her grandmother has died. At a loss to explain why Nana Queenie won’t be joining them this year, Grandad Stan tells Esme that Queenie has gone to join the circus. The lie becomes gradually more elaborate, until the real circus comes to town and forces him to reveal the truth.

The play walks its own tightrope between being lighthearted and energetic enough to keep the kids interested, and giving its subject matter the emotional weight it requires. Employing a popular device in children’s entertainment, the actors double as storytellers and keep things moving by narrating their actions. Repetition also keeps us tuned in to the central theme — that change is inevitable and part of life — which emerges as the take-home message for younger audiences.

The set design also helps draw kids into the action. The backdrop is an elaborate and bright painting of clouds and sea, and there is space for kids to sit on the “beach” that is the setting for most of what happens. The actors pay particular attention to the kids seated up front, and in return they don’t fidget or lose interest, all of them hanging intently to Esme’s final words.

There are omissions from this short production. Esme’s understanding of Queenie’s true fate — once she discovers it — is immediate, and at the end her primary memory of the week is their trip to the circus, which isn’t totally believable. But Esme’s coming to terms with the loss is outside the scope of the play, which is really about Stan’s agony over breaking the news to her. And this Kenny and director Thomas Morgan Jones have succeeded in handling with a clear understanding of their audience, and just the right mix of humour, pathos and song.