Lucinka of Inspector Sands Theatre tells us about Rock Pool, their funny, splashy, audio play with songs for 4-8 year olds (and adults!), made with support from Eden Court.

Five years ago Inspector Sands made a stage show for kids about a prawn and a crab stuck together in a tiny little rock pool. The sea creatures were thrown there by a freak wave and were left to wait for another big wave to take them back home to the sea. They didn’t know how long they’d be waiting. During their time on the rock they learnt to make a new life in a strange new world. Who knew that 5 years later the premise of this story would be so relevant to the worldwide COVID lockdown.

Giulia Innocenti and Thomas O’Connell, Rock Pool, stage version, 2013

When our world went upside down on the 23 March, we quickly decided to turn Rock Pool into an audio play. Besides its relevance, it’s also fun and funny, silly and splashy and has excellent songs. We wanted to find a way to reflect on kids’ experience of lockdown that would also make them laugh and hopefully want to sing along.

We wanted to offer something for kids and their families that didn’t involve looking at a screen. A chance to close your eyes and dive into an underwater sound world that allows your imagination to take over.

We were so excited to collaborate with Gillian Burke, brilliant climate change activist and BBC Springwatch presenter, who narrated Rock Pool and worked with us on the script. She set our sea-life facts straight and shared her passion for empowering kids to bring a positive approach to climate change and saving our oceans.

We love this talk with Gillian, where she makes the case for the unsung heroes that are insects:

Rock Pool is a story for bathtime or bedtime, for little or bigger kids, one to sing or draw along to, to inspire homemade spin offs and sequels. We hope there will be many 4-8 (plus!) year old prawns and crabs up and down the country in coming weeks, having their own adventures and making up their own songs. Watch out for our Make Your Own Rock Pool day coming up this Sunday – follow us on Instagram or Facebook for more details through the week.

Tune in to the adventures of Prawn and Crab during Book Week Scotland - all 6 episodes are free to steam from our website.

We leave you with (spoiler alert) some of our favourite sea-creature facts:

1. Starfish can regrow their legs if they lose one.

2. Limpet teeth are the strongest biological substance known to humankind.

3. An anemone’s mouth is also its bum.

We hope you’ll have a listen to Rock Pool, share far and wide with the small people (and bigger people) in your life, and we look forward to hearing your favourite sea-creature facts on our social media channels!

Rock Pool is made in association with Trigger  and with the support of our partners Bristol Old Vic, Royal & Derngate, Polka Theatre, Eden Court Theatre, Oxford Playhouse, Theatre Royal Plymouth and Farnham Maltings. Rock Pool is supported by Arts Council England.