For parents of kids 5-12, Mr. Popper’s Penguins at the New Victory Theatre on West 42nd Street offers a delightful time for children as well as for their parents or big-person bringers.  Even sophisticates will be charmed, especially those wearying of endless polls, arguments, discussions on what-ifs, and dire predictions if-when. The beloved book from 1934, and the several films that have been made from the rich source material about a man in love with the Antarctic who gets a gift of penguins, offers gleeful laughs and wonderment, no matter how old the viewer. The staging is inventive, with “invisible” helpers moving the onstage penguins with remarkable fealty to the actual movements of penguins.  Children soon forget the people animating the adorable noisy penguins in the staging.  Only five cast members fill out the entire 90 minutes, with jokes mostly aimed at child-level understanding, and a few overheads...(Read Full Post)