We take Theatre for Young Audiences (TYA) seriously here at ET. That’s why you can find it’s own link on our home page to all our TYA content. Of course it helps when our Head Editor, Mary Pollard, is a TYA fanatic.
So here’s our shortlist for our TYA category of the 2025 Ettie Awards, put together by that Head Editor. We’ll be announcing winners during our Runn Radio show on 3 March.
1. Journey of a Refugee @ Stanley Arts Centre
This exciting family show from Theatre-Rites is a visual delight that captures how effectively theatre can articulate someone else’s experience such that we deeply understand and connect with it. In an innocuous arts centre in Croydon we are taken on a journey across continents – sometimes playful, sometimes highly moving – following in the footsteps of a refugee seeking sanctuary in the UK.
Bewitching cultures from the Middle East are diffused throughout this complex, compelling performance, beautifully blending the world of the refugee with our own. Vibrant, sensory and emotional landscapes are created using breathtaking visuals and exotic music alongside deft puppetry and inventive object manipulation. The humanity of the refugee is underscored through the beauty and physicality of dance and via directly immersive interaction where the audience has a taste of immigration bureaucracy and is gently questioned as to their own legitimacy in the UK. It’s an exhilarating yet challenging adventure that will leave children and adults alike questioning what they really know about refugees coming to our shores.
2. Lottie the Travelling Doll @ Little Angel Theatre
Sometimes a show comes along that just feels really special and gives you little goosebumps, knowing it’s extraordinary. Lottie from String Theatre is one of those shows – an absolutely crafted piece of work in every way, full of beauty, excitement, joy and hopefulness. The story itself is based on Franz Kafka’s tales to a young girl whose doll, Lottie, went missing. It is a series of letters from the absent doll outlining the adventures she undertakes.
It’s rare to see marionettes performed these day, but they are used exquisitely here, with the vulnerable fragility of the puppets speaking to the fantastical, touching story depicted. The marionettes are further supported by shadow puppetry and glove puppets, to imaginatively bring ideas of scale to the journey and hilarious slapstick humour to the stage.
Once again, this is a production that is massively respectful to a young audience, offering them traditional artforms alongside contemporary interpretations without hesitation but with immense success. A hugely atmospheric soundtrack adds texture and depth to support the many emotional environments of the story, and the whole is an utterly enjoyable hour of wonder and belief in the impossible. This is a masterpiece.
3. Romeo and Juliet @ Polka Theatre
Who says Shakespeare is for the elite? Just when you thought Beat and Elements must surely have hit their peak, they come right back at you with something totally unexpected.
This Romeo and Juliet is a totally off the wall reimagination of the classic, combining hip hop theatre with Shakespeare to create a highly accessible, brilliantly enjoyable production. The quality of music and performance is absolutely superb in this show, used effectively to help translate a story of warring families to modern day Merton and give relevance to a 400 year old tale. Kate Donnachie in particular is an outstanding performer – really one to watch for the future.
4. Toto Kerblammo! @ Unicorn Theatre
With this show being written by theatre supremo Tim Crouch, you know you’re going to be in for a quality production, and it is indeed stunning – an emotionally charged exploration of one girl’s journey to find love in a harsh world, with the help of her loyal dog.
The audience are asked to wear headphones, and a binaural soundscape by Sound Designer Helen Skiera deeply immerses us in a story dealing with some really difficult themes such as broken families, homelessness and mental health issues. This intense environment ensures that we “Listen. Really listen” to this child’s issues and engage on a uniquely intimate level. It’s powerfully challenging – breathtaking even, but intelligent and respectful, as it innovatively creates new spaces in which to articulate understandings. And the dog is fabulous!
5. Princess and the Pea @ Unicorn Theatre
Before we begin, let me tell you that this all round exceptional, inspirational show is for ages 2+. That’s toddlers upwards.
In a jewel bright production that is thrillingly active, vibrantly colourful and funny an incredibly talented cast of four performers tell the famous fairy tale, with astonishing acrobatics, silly slapstick, and marvellous music that will leave you gasping. They present almost superhuman possibility to the young audience as they scale the heights of a tower of sixteen mattresses, spin and whirl each other around, create magic with sleight of hand and transform the ordinary into the extraordinary. It’s phenomenal! And as an almost entirely non-verbal show the whole is accessible to a huge audience beyond the tinies – perhaps those for whom English is not a first language, or who are D/deaf. Inclusion is a splendid thing.
This is a joyful, exciting, wonderful show with shining production values that just screams respect for its audiences. And I love it!
6. The Zoo that Comes to You @ Little Angel Theatre
I remember this show from Scarlet Oak Theatre fondly and particularly well, largely because it is an entertaining, beautifully performed, sensitively written and impactful piece of work with delightful, sympathetically characterised puppets – but also for another reason.
The tone of the play is just perfect; entertaining, musical and funny but cleverly educational, as we meet several animal characters who all turn out to have become endangered due to human behaviours. It’s wonderfully refreshing to hear the young audience addressed intelligently on quite difficult topics while encouraging them to be actively involved in an important discussion about the environment. They learn how small changes in their own lives can make a real difference in supporting conservation efforts, then are delighted to meet the characters post-show, leaving with a tangible sense of possibility that we can all make change if we try. It’s a fabulous production for schools, kids’ parties and family groups to enjoy together (or just individual reviewers who love puppets).
The other reason I remember this production is that (as is sadly usual for children’s theatre) no other reviewers came and the company messaged me after publication to say they suddenly felt seen. It’s utterly heartbreaking that such quality work is not being given the visibility it deserves. The Zoo that Comes to You for me this year absolutely underscored the urgent requirement for environmental action in the theatre industry too, where Theatre for Young Audiences is hugely underrepresented if not misrepresented. Go see some in 2025. You will definitely not be disappointed!
The winner will be announced on 3 March during our Runn Radio Show.
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