Originally published on May 6, 2019.

Miranda Antoinette Troutt (as Anne Frank) and Benjamin Neil McCormack (as Peter Van Daan) are both recent Cornish graduates.

Miranda Antoinette Troutt (as Anne Frank) and Benjamin Neil McCormack (as Peter Van Daan) are both recent Cornish graduates. The Diary of Anne Frank plays through May 19. Photo by Zach Rosing/Courtesy of SCT

You probably think you already know the story. I know that’s what I thought, entering Seattle Children’s Theatre to see The Diary of Anne Frank over the weekend.

Not only did I think I knew the story, I thought I knew the play inside and out. It was in our English curriculum in middle school. After we read it, we watched the movie. A few years later, in acting classes, our instructor had us use passages from the play to do scene work. Ten years later, in 2005, I visited Amsterdam and toured the annex where Anne Frank, her sister, her parents, another set of parents and their son, and a dentist, all lived, in hiding, from 1942 to 1944. I almost kept it together the whole time, but when I got to the last room and saw a board game hanging on the wall, I lost it.

The set at Seattle Children’s Theatre is not the same layout as the actual annex (of course), but it’s a fine approximation, and this production is worth seeing, because it’s filled with phenomenal performances.

Christopher Frizzelle was The Stranger's print editor, and first joined the staff in 2003. He was the editor-in-chief from 2007 to 2016, and edited the story by Eli Sanders that won a 2012 Pulitzer...