Babes in Toyland and Actors - The convenience of a shrink ray

Ok, so this is going to be one of those random thoughts that I said might be part of this blog. Does anyone remember the 1961 film Babes in Toyland with Annette Funicello? Even though I was born in 1986 this movie was a huge factor of my childhood. The plot according to IMDB goes like this... Tom the Piper's Son is about to marry Mary Quite Contrary. On the eve of their wedding, evil miser Barnaby hires two henchmen to drown Tom and steal Mary's sheep, cared for by Little Bo Peep, thus depriving Mary and the children she lives with of their livelihood, forcing her to marry Barnaby. The sheep are stolen, but Gonzorgo and Roderigo, Barnaby's henchmen, double-cross him by selling Tom to a band of gypsies instead, leaving Tom with the opportunity to escape and make his way with Mary, Bo-Peep, and other Mother Goose characters to Toyland.

I feel I must have watched this move about 15 times as a child. It was one of my favorites probably because it had mystery, villains, gypsies (of course), mother goose and a shrink ray. Granted at times I was a bit afraid of the toy soldiers on parade. I have had the dream at least 20 times in the past 20 years about how convenient it would be to own a shrink ray and the opposite one, a de-shrinking ray, that also enlarges your item back to normal size.  As actors we travel, case in point I have been to over 35 states and probably 30 of them had to do with performing of some kind. I am currently packing for this next adventure and all I can think of is how easy it would be to shrink everything I have or need and put it in a small cigar box, travel where I need to go use the de-shrink ray and voila. There would be no back breaking, no heavy lifting, and you would get to take more that usual. 


As a child I used to always re-arrange my room about once every two months because I liked change. I used to think if I could use the shrink ray to make this bed and dresser smaller, how easy it would be to do this every month rather than two. I am sure my mother was happy these instruments don't exist. But lets take a small gander into the future. Is it so impossible to think that with that way science makes leaps and bounds every year that in the future there would be a discovery to change the molecular structure of a concrete object? Very sciencey I know but my dreams were never that of herding sheep rather always something a bit deeper. Think of the possibilities that this could do, but yet again think of also the risk of danger associated if the weapon got into the wrong hands, like it did in the movie. But hey that is why dreams are dreams. Right?


V