8-Year-Old Puts on Neighborhood Production of Lion King in his Garage

Baker Anderson produces his own version of Disney's "The Lion King."

DULUTH, Minn.- Here’s some good news for fans of the stage– turns out you don’t have to travel all the way to Broadway to see a production of The Lion King.

An 8-year–old Duluth boy is putting his own version of the show, and he’s getting the whole neighborhood involved.

Baker Anderson is use to being on stage- you can catch him at theater camp or in a show at the Duluth Playhouse, but after seeing the new live–action remake of Disney’s The Lion King, he wanted to produce his own version of the show in his garage.

“This is how our garage has been for probably the last two months, so we haven’t been able to park in here,” Baker’s mom Trista Anderson said.

You may be used to a neighborhood game of kickball in the cul–de–sac, but it’s not every day that you see a dozen kids rally together to put on their own Broadway show.

“I don’t know, I just thought it would be fun,” Baker said.

Baker Anderson is the mastermind behind it all.

One day he asked his parents to print off scripts of The Lion King to share with his friends.

“Some kids will shoot pucks in the summer, he sat and watched Broadway clips of the lion king and took notes and studied moves and looked at the costumes,” Trista said.

As the show started coming together, the whole family got involved.

“Well, we painted masks that would sit on top of your heads so they wouldn’t be in your face. And we painted that,” Baker said, pointing to a painted backdrop.

Now that the set is done, the kids are spending time in rehearsal.

“When he’s passionate about something, he’s all in and it doesn’t seem like work to him. To me it seems like a lot of work, but to him it’s like pure joy,” Trista said.

That includes memorizing lines, learning dances and really getting into character.

“We figured we’ll give them a month to figure out some things and then we’ll just give it… give it a try,” Trista said.

Baker hopes that the play will inspire people to open up and be more artistic.

“Maybe even do a play in their garage,” Baker said.

The Baker Anderson production of The Lion King will be curtain up September 28.

The kids are going to try and sell tickets to the show to people in the neighborhood in hopes of donating money to Animal Allies, in honor of the animals in The Lion King.