Amy Wallis is the red-headed orphan in the Toronto production of Anne of Green Gables. (Dancap)

After 40 successful seasons on the red earth of Prince Edward Island, Anne of Green Gables: The Musical is getting a rough reception in Toronto.

The musical based on the beloved stories of Lucy Maud Montgomery has been brought to Toronto by Dancap Productions.

The first staging of the show was in 1965, and it has been a reliable hit at the Charlottetown Festival ever since, making it the longest-running musical in Canada.

Toronto reviewers admit to a soft spot for the original story of the fiery red-headed girl, but they've dismissed this production as in need of an upgrade.

"The writing of the show — largely by the team of Don Harron and Norman Campbell — is still a fine example of good old-fashioned musical theatre writing," said reviewer Richard Ouzouninan, writing in the Toronto Star.

"But musicals everywhere have changed in the intervening decades, and no one continues to revive shows in the exact style that they were created."

Ouzounian found fault with the old-fashioned set design, the choreography, which, in his view, lacked "precision and sharpness," and the direction by Anne Allen. Each of the cast members seems to have chosen a different acting style, he said, dismissing Janet MacEwen's Marilla as a "cartoon character."

Eye Weekly's Paul Gallant liked Amy Wallis as Anne, though he found she sometimes failed to mine the humour in scenes such as the dramatic apology the orphan makes to Mrs. Lynde.

But he had no such praise for her male counterparts.

"As father-figure Matthew, Sandy Winsby impersonates a hick but sounds like a neutered Muppet. Sean Hauk's Gilbert Blythe is more dopey than dreamy, which is a shame since the will-they-or-won't-they tension should pull us through the disparate episodes of the second act," he wrote in the entertainment weekly.

The Toronto Sun titled its review "Vote Anne Off the Island."

Reviewer John Colbourne wrote that the producers seem to have lost sight of the charm of the original story.

"Instead of a desperate orphan who has been knocked from pillar to post all her young life, this is an Anne who hits the stage with the grace and confidence of a National Ballet School graduate, quickly putting paid to whatever minor silly reservations might be harboured by the taciturn Matthew Cuthbert and his dour sister, Marilla, before wrapping an entire island around her pretty little finger," writes Colbourne.

"What's missing, of course, is the struggle — the grit found in the triumph of true innocence — in a show that seems to be paying only lip service to both the rigours and the joys of a simple island life. Maybe, after 40 plus years, it's time to focus a bit less on staging Anne of Green Gables and worry a bit more about telling her story."

Anne of Green Gables: The Musical plays at the Elgin Theatre until May 24. Many of the principals of the production will return to the Charlottetown Festival show, which begins June 18.