Polite Mammals

ArtPlay is bringing Polite Mammals to life this May – a colourful and charismatic theatre show co-created with children.

ArtPlay brings together children (from babies to 13 years of age) and artists to explore and create innovative arts experiences that encourage self-expression and playful exchange.

Polite Mammals

Polite Mammals is created by award-winning kids’ comedy group and physical artists The Wholesome Hour, as part of ArtPlay’s New Ideas Lab - a program that supports artists and children to work together to develop new arts experiences.

Polite Mammals will invite children and their parents to explore animals in all their forms -from the stinky and sparkly to the real and imaginary. The 60-minute program will be filled with singing, dancing, puppets, and funny characters dreamed up by children.

The Wholesome Hour performer, Lily Fish, said Polite Mammals is a kaleidoscope of colour, laughter and creativity.

“We hope the children will see themselves reflected in the work - their humour, their world view and their experiences. But most importantly we want them to leave the theatre absolutely exhausted from laughing so much,” she said.

“We have developed Polite Mammals through a series of play and task-based physical theatre devising workshops. This included playing lots of games, pretending to be animals in different situations and writing songs from the perspective of animals.

“The children then drew their favourite moments. These drawings contributed further to the development of the show including the design elements.”

The Wholesome Hour is a Melbourne based physical theatre company. Current members include award-winning theatre makers Ell Sachs (The Travelling Sisters), Sunanda Sachatrakul and Lily Fish and Kimberley Twiner.