The rules of traditional theatre are well established: sit quietly during the play, keep your focus on the stage, applaud when it’s over and do not, for any reason, engage with the actors. If any of these rules are broken, a fellow audience member might give you the stink-eye or an enraged, “Shhh!”

With all of these restrictions, introducing children to theatre can seem daunting even though performances for young audiences often provide more flexibility. Kids are still expected to sit somewhat still and focus, and while an eight year old might find that possible, an eight month old will be frantic with wiggles and wails by the end.

Spark! Theatre, a new Austin theatre company creating interactive performances for very young children, wants those wigglers at their shows. Founder and Artistic Director Bethany Lynn Corey was the arts coordinator for a preschool in Washington DC, where she began to explore how she could use the arts as a fun and playful way to engage young children.

Now in her third year of the MFA Drama for Youth and Communities program at UT Austin, she is focusing her research on Theatre for the Very Young (TVY), an umbrella term to describe theatre being created for children under five. Co-Founder and Assistant Director, Meg Greene, also taught drama-based early childhood classes in DC and wants to help foster and stimulate young children’s curiosity to help them learn about the world.

Corey explains, “Because of the age group, we're not looking for passive audience members – not traditional ‘good audience behavior.’ We're looking for and expecting students to engage verbally and physically… a two year old will respond whenever they see fit. Embracing that is part of what makes Theatre for the Very Young exciting.”

Corey created Spark’s first show for The University Co-Op Present The Cohen New Works Festival as a challenge to herself. She decided to create a nonverbal piece of theatre for children under the age of three, and the New Works Festival offered her a chance to try. It’s new territory for many companies in the United States, although British children’s theatre companies like Unicorn Theatre and Polka Theatre have embraced it over the past five years.

She created HANDS, an interactive piece for children under two that explored, well, hands. “Hands are one of the first things that kids discover and that really young children are learning to use. The actors were learning and discovering all these things they could do with their hands and letting the audience try too.” Spark’s other shows also move from the concrete to the fantastical to explore what children will come across in their daily lives.

Parents who came to see HANDS asked when Corey planned to create another show; in response, She recruited an ensemble of actors and a creative team. They currently have an ensemble of eight UT undergrads and alumni actors and an advisory team of faculty and community members eager to help the company grow.

Their two current shows, Puddles and Jamie Who Doesn’t Want to Take a Bath, focus on interactive ways to explore the idea of weather — particularly the rain — and bath time. In Jamie, the mother character turns to the audience and says, “Let's find fun things to do with wash cloths. Let's put them on our heads, on our shoulders, on our toes! What else can we do with our wash cloths?” Kids are invited to respond, and the actors validate and encourage their choices.

While this might not seem obviously educational, very young children have different developmental needs than students even a few years older. Spark! performances teach vocabulary through repeated images and words, give young children a space to interact safely with adults and other children, and foster a sense of curiosity and a desire for learning.

Spark! asks parents and adults to play alongside their children, and even an adult who comes solo to check out the show will be asked to put a wash cloth on their head. Corey says that the adults often have as much fun as the kids and, “We joke about how we're going to do a midnight showing that's all for adults.” The benefits of child-driven play are well documented, and adults can also benefit from being silly and following their children’s lead.

Since young children don't know the rules, "anything can happen," say Corey. "Those moments of interaction really make an impact."

This fall, Spark! hopes to offer their shows at no cost to day care centers, preschools and community centers around Austin. They’re currently raising money via IndieGogo to help cover the costs of sets, props, costumes, marketing, transportation and space rentals.

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To see Spark! in action, attend their workshop performance at the Austin Children’s Museum on May 5 or see them performing this Sunday, April 22 at 1:20 p.m. for Austin Earth Day at the Mueller Development.