"So popular was last spring's world premiere of Hana's Suitcase, that it is back to launch the 2006-07 season at the Lorraine Kimsa Theatre for Young People. The Holocaust is brought carefully, touchingly, vividly, and tangibly into focus for both the young characters in the play and the audience through a remarkable, yet in many ways ordinary, story that connects the past with the present...All of this is staged with the right mix of ingenuity and subtlety to draw us in without hitting us over the head."

"On the adage of better late than never, I finally saw the smash hit Hana's Suitcase...It is a very moving play for any age. One can appreciate how Sher understands children. He puts in humour that pleases them and lots of repetition so they understand the story... The play represents the best of what children's theatre should be. "

"Hana's Suitcase is even richer on second viewing. Emil Sher 's play, adapted from Karen Levine 's children's book, has been revived by Lorraine Kimsa Theatre for Young People as part of a national tour. ...The detective-story first act focuses on the Japanese characters piecing together facts about Hana, who early on stands silent, often surrounded by anonymous masked figures. Only in the second half do she and her family speak, as we learn their story through narration and acted-out scenes. Playwright Emil Sher and director Allen MacInnis do a marvellous job of blending the two time periods. Sometimes the Japanese children ask a question and someone from the 40's story answers, while on occasion the two sets of characters inhabit the same space, giving the narration an elastic and dramatic vitality. The play also raises powerful questions for adults, such as how much to tell children about an event like the Holocaust. "

"Sher's adaptation does an admirable job of weaving back and forth between the past and present. We learn Hana's history gradually, just like the Japanese schoolchildren did, wanting to know more even though we dread the discovery... With great economy, Sher takes us through the early days of insisting "it can't happen here" and the ever-increasing strictures placed on the Jewish residents, to the horrible moments when first Hana's mother, then her father, are taken away...We're able to move from a Tokyo classroom to the Polish death camps with terrifying rapidity...The final scene has Akira vowing to "find a way out of this sadness" and deciding to present a play about Hana to students all over Japan, so that "this will never happen again." His belief in the healing power of art is powerfully moving and when their "play" shows Maiko riding her scooter across the stage just as Hana did at the beginning, you will probably sit in the theatre with tears streaming down your face."