The Croons

AIMED at four to six year olds and full of invention, music and audience participation, The Croons is custom made for the Ark. A hit in last summer's MusicFest, it is currently playing for school groups during the week and for families over the next two Saturdays.

The setting is the Ark (as in Noah's), where the huge, wonderfully bulbous creatures of the title are still residing - bowing to their failure to reproduce (one look at them and you can imagine why). However, as we join them they've just had a baby; while Mammy. Croon gets some much needed rest, Daddy Croon (Robert Harris) struggles with caring for the nipper (Louis Lovett), who himself is struggling to find his croon voice.

Nico Brown, who devised and directs this play with Ark director Martin Drury, plays the croons keeper, but his real job is keeping the audience involved. He does so beautifully - apart from one over extended storytelling passage - and gently unfolds the play's themes about family dynamics and growing up and away from) parents.

Arguably, some children might be confused by Baby Croon's rapid evolution from a baby who needs minding to one who leaves the nest; this parent found it unutterably poignant. In general, however, The Croons is neither baffling nor sad, but very, very funny.