SALT LAKE CITY — People are strange. New people are so odd that we call them strangers. For young children, the universe is full of things that are new, strange, and they make new discoveries about themselves almost every day. For one upstart theatre company, the goal is to engage children and help them see that while the world can invoke curiosity, it can also be friendly.
Artists and University of Utah theatre alumni Lauren Carn and Bryce Romleski have teamed up to create a company called To The Moon that creates Theatre for the Very Young (TVY) works. Their production of Friendly Universe runs 15 minutes long TVY is a field that creates immersive, interactive and sensory theatre experiences for children ages 0-5.
Friendly Universe is next to non-verbal as the actors tell the story of an Astronaut (Lauren Carn) landing in a new place, encountering a brightly colored Alien (Bryce Romleski). The two develop a friendship through taking pictures, making discoveries together and overcoming the challenge of a broken space ship.
What works is the absolutely commitment of Carn and Romleski to these characters. While child audiences have been reported to respond positively to the show, I wasn’t able to observe that on the Sunday matinee I attended. The whole audience for the performance I attended was me and another reviewer (Keola Kinghorn of Rhetorical Review and UTBA), but our advanced age and small numbers were no deterrent. I felt that the actors would have given the same electric and buoyant performance to a dozen toddlers. These actors kept the story true and took time to engage us in sensory play with juggling scarves and playing with a ball.
In conversations with the creators, one of the key foci for the fifteen-minute production was to give the very young audience members the chance to exercise their gross motor skills. Post-show play space allows for littles to explore, interact, and play. This attention to the developmental aspect of the production helped Friendly Universe feel like a grounded and polished product. The musical underscoring kept a steady tempo and the play had a clear story to follow along with.
That said, the show, ultimately, feels too succinct. The story beats for audience members that young passed very quickly. The show was timed to music, so it would take some reimagining, but I’d have loved to see the actors have the chance to let moments land more This was a show that could have taken the time to breathe and been 45 minutes without too much variation. Even a 30-minute version allows for a more grounded experience that allows the littles the show is intended for to engage and process. While it can feel risky to try to keep the attention span of toddlers for that long, the show had the bones of doing this well and I’m excited to see how To The Moon develops future works. Utah’s family oriented community should be gobbling up opportunities like this and as the art form grows in the state. While this fledgling TVY company is growing, it has the potential to make the universe a friendlier place across the state. More please.
MORE INFO: FRIENDLY UNIVERSE plays at the Regent Street Blackbox at the Eccles Theatre (….) from February 7-8 with performances at 10am and 11am. The show runs fifteen minutes and is open to all ages, though the target audience is 2-5. Each attendee, even babes in arms, are required to have a ticket. Tickets are $13.00. For information about future productions from To The Moon, follow @ToTheMoonTheatre on Instagram and Facebook.