Has anyone done the musical HONK! recently?  It would be a terrific time saver if I could rent or purchase your giant "Egg Shell" props for the hatching scene.   (Needed May, 2009 in North Carolina). 

My son's little theater did "Honk" and for the eggs simply used pastel-colored bedsheets.   The ducklings sat cross-legged with their backs to the audience, stretching each sheet around themselves. I'm sure the director helped position them properly to get the proper shape. I thought it conveyed the image beautifully without breaking the bank.

Hey, I found a good link to lots of previous productions of HONK!   But I'm still hunting for a place that might still have the eggshells.

http://www.lilyrose.org/stilesdrewe/eggbox.html

I'll keep looking until the start of the new year, and then I'll just build my own. I have a brother that builds sailboats, so it might be fun to construct giant eggs out of fiberglass, like a boat hull! Then the shells would be sturdy enough to have hinged doors or lids that crack open. That would be very cool.   Plus I would like to try a sight gag where just the two feet pop out of a shell and the egg runs around the stage blindly until hitting a wall and cracking open!

Besides, if I build them myself, I could pass them on to others of you out there who are doing this show.   We'll see... -Dana

I used $2.00 worth of Large balloons from Walmart, $10.00 worth of cheap "terry cloth" from Hobby Lobby, $10.00 worth of plaster of paris from Hobby Lobby and made my own solution of cast material (like for a broken arm) by dipping pieces of the terry cloth into the solution of watered down plaster of paris and putting it over the inflated large ballons.  VERY strong and already looked (WITHOUT painting it) like egg shell.  "Cheap" terry cloth, when dipped in the solution, acted like a large version of the gauze they charge $10.00 for - for a very small roll.  One layer thick was strong and still relatively light weight.
Attached these to the tops of old marching band hats (helmets with the "fur" stripped off - left the chin straps on and attached it with small twisted wire).  The ugly duckling's shell was much larger by inflating that balloon bigger.  With the actors squatted down in the "nest" it looked like a nest of eggs.  Our "shells" went clear down to the actors shoulders and the "broken edges" of the shells (cut zig-zag) were cut so their faces showed when they held their heads up straight.  Cut the edges of the "shells" with a Drimmel tool.
In fact - we did "Honk!" as a summer "theatre camp" and had the cast help make the shells as part of the "Set and Props" class.
I put some water in the balloons before inflating them (to keep them in place) and set them on top of buckets to apply the dipped terry cloth.  They were dry the next day.  Worked great.

We are doing HONK on May 15, 16, 17, 2009 with 5th and 6th grade actors.   I would like our egg shells to be hollow so they can crack out of them.  Will yours be hollowed out?