Atom and Luna R&D 2 - interim report for Arts Council England

The Chronicles of Atom and Luna Part 2 EVALUATION REPORT

The Chronicles of Atom and Luna Part 2 2

EVALUATION REPORT 2

ABOUT FUNNELWICK LIMB 3

SUMMARY AND OVERVIEW 4

SUMMARY DELIVERY 5

KEY CHANGES 6

COLCHESTER ATOM AND LUNA WEEKEND 8

NOTTINGHAMSHIRE INSPIRE LIBRARIES DIGITAL RESIDENCY 9

ACTIVITY PACKS 10

WIVENHOE R&D SEPTEMBER 2022 11

TOUR DEVELOPMENT 14

WORLD POETRY DAY SCHOOLS DAYS 14

WRABNESS R&D 16

WILD RUMPUS ACTIVITY DAY 19

MARKETING DEVELOPMENT WORK 20

APPENDIX ONE - THE CREATIVE TEAM 24

APPENDIX TWO - THE PROPOSED TOUR 25

ABOUT FUNNELWICK LIMB

Funnelwick Limb exists to develop cross platform storytelling work, primarily but not exclusively, for family audiences. We combine live performance with family friendly VR experiences, games and audio content with good old schoolbooks. We want to inspire and enable digitally savvy young people to get lost in language, learn how to create their own stories using different mediums and develop a live performance habit. We’re nurturing a new generation of cultural creators and consumers, equipped and hungry for words and the kinds of cultural experiences we can’t yet imagine, unhindered by the barriers to engagement that exist for many today. Funnelwick Limb grew out of the success of The Mystery of the Rendlesham Mumps (launched in April 2019 to critical acclaim – as a book, as an audio drama, as a tablet game, as a VR experience and as a live show) and continues to push new boundaries in children’s storytelling

www.funnelwicklimb.com

Funnelwick Limb are in alphabetical order of first name:-

Matthew Linley (Creative Producer)

Murray Lachlan Young (lead artist)

Nina Hajiyianni (Creative Director)

SUMMARY AND OVERVIEW

The Chronicles of Atom and Luna Part 2 has been all about testing, experimenting and building. As a result of that we have learnt a huge amount, solved many problems and found many more questions which we have collected here in this evaluation document.

Our continued commitment to the principles which underpin Let’s Create has been demonstrated again and again throughout the years work. Through the last year we have had over 1200 meaningful engagements with young people in a range of settings (in school, at open air events, on organised walks and events). Young people’s creativity feeds our creative practice, so our outreach work is not an adjunct, it’s the engine room of what we do.

The work we have done has put in place really strong foundations for the launch of The Atom and Luna stage tour which we hope to deliver in Autumn 22, and which is currently being considered as NLPG-00553836.

We emerge from phase 2 with:

● A script that we are all excited by

● Creative solutions to the demands of that script

● A white card design.

● A full cast and composer in place, along with a newly developed role: Forager in Residence, and having had time to work together to develop a strong, supportive team ethic and a group of creatives all excited by the work we are making A full Autumn tour booked, lasting 10 weeks, visiting 19 venues across the UK including rural touring, schools, studios and main stages

● A much bigger mailing list and social media following and a more developed marketing infrastructure.

● Having fully tested a range of wrap around activities that we can offer venues. Our activities over the year successfully tested live, digital and blended approaches

● Having developed our schools work and offer (in total 1270 people participated in our test activities, more than we anticipated in the application)

● We have developed strong relationships with our venues - and our R&Ds have provided us with plenty of content to share with them from our story post cards to seed cards, from poster and story trails to video content from both R&Ds, along with a rich vein of photographic material.

● Having developed an outline business plan for 2022 to 2025.

SUMMARY DELIVERY

What What 2 Testing How many

Colchester Atom and Luna weekend August 2021

Colchester Atom and Luna story walks August 2021

Nottinghamshire Inspire Libraries August 2021

Poetry Display with creative games and exercises in Holytrees Museum

Story walk with audio headsets and live performer

Digital Residencies libraries were given postcards, seed cards, poster searches etc.

The poetry display Family engagement with the AR Creative exercises

How we can further utilise the audio tales to reach a wider audience

Across 3 days 325 individuals engaged

Across 2 days and 8 tours 83 participants

A non in person residency Estimated engagement figures across the residency 250

Wivenhoe R&D (moved from Ipswich) September 2021

4 day R&D to really push and develop the story of The Chronicles of Atom and Luna

The story and how it develops 2 actors 1 director 1 designer 1 resident forager 1 mythology advisor 1 producer 1 assistant producer 8 people

World Poetry Day Zooms March 2022 6 sessions

Wivenhoe Regatta 1 session 2 July 2022

Wrabness Residency

2 11-14 July 2022 (replaced new audio tours)

Poetry zoom session with Murray and our mythology advisor

Activities and awareness around Atom and Luna

4 day R&D designed to help us work out how we tell the story, and to test two new performers

Online schools delivery, introducing schools to Atom and Luna Including one out of school session

Creative exercises with public, raising profile of Atom and Luna

Testing how we perform the show and the work done on the script

6 sessions across 15 classes 780 pupils

120 people engaged

4 actors 1 writer 1 director 1 producer 1 forager in residence 1 composer 9 people

Wix and Wrabness School Workshop 13 July 2022

Whole afternoon workshop, learnt the mushroom song,

Testing a creative/foraging in public schools workshop 45 pupils across 2 year groups

Wrabness Foraging Walk

13 July 2022

went foraging, creative session

Foraging walk with our resident forager, tied into the story of Atom and Luna

Testing potential wrap around activities

Wild Rumpus Activity Day

16 July 2022

Mailing List growth We worked on growing our newsletter sign ups through competition work and setting up an Explorers Club newsletter for followers

Digital Asset growth Drive up views/listens of both the audio tales and the AR

Testing how Atom and Luna wrap around activities might work (i.e. headphone walks, creative exercises, games and foraging walks)

We have tried shift the focus to being able to provide activities to engage followers and families

20 people attended

3 artists 35 people attended

Social Media growth Grow our organic reach across our social media channels (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, promote our digital assets and audio stories.)

Explore different ways of driving audiences to our existing digital assets - the 6 story casts and the AR

We developed a social media plan and strategy that included making the most of our current digital assets like the AR smartphone game trailers, Atom and Luna Artwork and audience feedback quotes.

See Marketing: Mailing List

See social media section

KEY CHANGES

• In order to focus more on the new commission (the play script), we replaced the planned new audio tales with an additional R&D week to take place in Wrabness in July 22. In order to ensure there was public benefit we included a schools’ workshop and community foraging walk in the programme.

• We introduced a new creative role into the team Forager in Residence. Over the course of the R&D this role has solidified and become increasingly crucial. The role has included:

- Advising the creative team on the character of Old Mother Redbeard, on how she survives in the wood, and where her ‘power’ and medical knowledge might actually come from

Advising the creative team on the myths and stories of nature and how they relate to The Chronicles of Atom and Luna

Leading public foraging walks which link back to the story of Atom and Luna

- Leading education sessions which link back to the story of Atom and Luna

Contributing tasks and exercises to our outreach work, including our regular explorer emails

• These changes together with the continued scheduling challenges directly and indirectly caused by the pandemic - meant that the project ran for a full year (01/08/2021 through to 16/07/2022, an extension of some 7 months)

COLCHESTER ATOM AND LUNA WEEKEND A REVIEW

Our

started

In Hollytrees Museum, and with the support of 3 paid emerging producers, we hosted the first of our activity sessions. In Castle Park we ran 2 days of story tours with a live performer (Tom

Hurran) interacting with the Atom and Luna audio tales.

(*L to R) The poetry display in Hollytrees Museum; Tom Campe leading one of the storytelling walks through Castle Park

Tom Campe and the Acorns - part of the storytelling walks in Castle Park, August 21 All photos of the Colchester Weekend by Young Producer and Photographer Isabell Scott

project

with the Colchester Weekend in Castle Park and Hollytrees Museum, which was supported by Colchester BID.

Campe, directed by Scott

Key learning - the display

• audiences loved the seed cards

• Audiences were intrigued and used the story phone (an old telephone which plays the 6 audio tales)

• audiences were less keen to download the Augmented Reality game, mainly because:

• It was difficult to explain in the time we had

• People are reluctant to download apps there and then (most people agreed to take a leaflet but very few did subsequently download the game)

Key learning - the story tours

• Whilst the story tours were met with generally good reviews and audience feedback (some audience comments are picked up below) there were a number of creative conclusions that we came to:

• merging two episodes didn’t really work and was unnecessary

• the live performer was a nice to have, but not essential

• what did particularly work was the moments of group interaction. Could these be retro fitted into the current tales? Certainly audience actions should be built into future story tours

Key learning - overall

• Although broadly very well received two criticisms were pertinent. One group was disappointed that the story tour was not performed live (instead of a mute performer, and a track). Another felt the stories were a little scary. Both of these point to the importance of clear communication.

Actions going forward as we move into The Chronicles of Atom and Luna tour

• In the future consider a demonstration phone/tablet for touring with the show?

• Consider how we can add audience led actions into the story tours.

NOTTINGHAMSHIRE INSPIRE LIBRARIES DIGITAL RESIDENCY A REVIEW

Through phase one we developed a series of digital assets which together make up a digital touring pack. These assets include:

• The six audio tours as Youtube videos to embed on the host site

• Seven Audio Tour posters which can be posted around a site - collect all 7 to win a prize. Each poster has a QR code which leads to a story tale or the AR.

• To this we could add the elements of the activity pack postcard sets, seed cards and book marks as give aways and prizes

Key learning

• We have a great package of content here, but we haven’t yet found the right way to package it. Digital engagement numbers continued to be disappointing

• We need to be more on the front foot with hosts encouraging and cajoling

• Before we send out the ‘digital tour’ to our ‘live’ venue partners we will take time to review how we can best repackage the assets for maximum audience engagement,

Actions going forward as we move into The Chronicles of Atom and

Luna tour

• Before we send out the ‘digital tour’ to our ‘live’ venue partners we will take time to review how we can best repackage the assets for maximum audience engagement,

ACTIVITY PACKS A REVIEW

We successfully created a series of activity packs, funded by Colchester Borough Homes. The activity packs contain:

• 3 x story cards to send to friends (each has a QR code link to a story so you are in effect sending a story)

• 1 story trail (an adapted version of The Great Oak featuring Murray’s words and Bek’s drawings, children are encourages to hide the cards, draw a map of where the cards are and ask a friend/parent/carer to search out the story)

• 1 x cut out and keep Atom and Luna

• 1 bookmark and leaflet designed to encourage download of the AR

• 1 activity sheet 3 tasks to help us tell the story of Atom and Luna

• A project sticker

Activity packs were successfully distributed at summer schools through our partners: Eastern Angles and Action Transport Theatre.

Key learning

• The time taken to compile the activity boxes was a real problem, and have affected the number of boxes we have had the capacity to compile. Not sure how we resolve this other than a packing party!

Actions going forward as we move into The Chronicles of Atom and Luna tour

• Develop a clear plan with our venues, sharing activity boxes with venues who can best make use of them (after school clubs, activity sessions etc.)

• Particular focus should be placed on Colchester, given the original boxes were funded by Colchester Borough Homes (link to the Mercury Theatre performance)

Our all female Wivenhoe R&D team (From L to R) Sangita Lakhanpal (Mythology

Bek Palmer (designer), Nina Hajiyianni (director), Becca Bindang and Farrell Cox (performer). Missing from the picture Lora Aziz (Forager in Residence)

Our September R&D was moved from Ipswich to Wivenhoe taking place in the William Loveless Hall (with the support of Wivenhoe Town Council) and in the neighbouring Wivenhoe Woods.

Over the week as well as development sessions (both indoors and outdoors) Sangita Lakhanpal led Yoga and Mythology sessions, Lora Aziz led a foraging walk for the team and film maker Samera Bowers documented our work. For her short R&D video see here

Unfortunately just ahead of the R&D our writer Murray Lachlan Young contracted Covid and was only able to attend the sessions via zoom. As a result, we adjusted the focus of the session to explore the narrative behind the story what was working, what wasn’t, what we need clarifying, what needed sharpening, what needed removing. This was then fed back to Murray via zoom calls and 1:1 sessions with director Nina Hajiyianni.

Key Learning

• Perhaps most importantly the story works and it very much has resonance to today’s world.

• Working both inside and out, and with the support of Lora and Sangita the importance of the natural world to our story became front and centre.

Advisor),

• The R&D also saw us successfully test two performers for the roles of Atom and Luna. After the success of the R&D we pledged to continue working with Becca and Farrell. The R&D gave us an opportunity to see what both performers could bring to the roles.

• Our ongoing collaboration with Lora Aziz (as Forager in Residence) started during this R&D

Actions going forward

• We achieved a huge amount in the time available but we of course missed having Murray in the room. This was especially the case as, unlike The Mystery of the Raddlesham Mumps, we were developing the script as part of the creation process (rather than script, followed by creative process).

• The nature of the story that emerged in the R&D also presented a series of dramatic challenges a giant hare, a wolf transformation, an exploding ball, various animals and a transformation battle

• As a result, we rejigged the schedule and budget to allow for a second R&D - with 4 performers - to happen in Wrabness in July

All photos from the Wivenhoe residency by Matthew Linley

Our forager in Residence leading a foraging walk for the cast and company. (From L to R) Lora Aziz, Nina Hajiyianni, Bek Palmer, Sangita, Becca Bindang

Performers Farrell Cox and Becca Bindang rehearsing in Wivenhoe Woods Director Nina Hajiyianni, Film Maker Sameera Bowers and Performers Becca Bindang and Farrell Cox in Wivenhoe Woods

TOUR DEVELOPMENT

As we hoped, the Wivenhoe R&D gave us the momentum, material and assets to develop a comprehensive tour for our new play. From the R&D we were able to use the short film (see here) and develop a programmers pack (see here)

The tour

• Builds on our partnership with our in association producers Eastern Angles Theatre Company and Theatre Porto. Our connections with EA have helped us to build a strong East leg of the tour 4 venues and 2 schools including EA itself. Our connection to Theatre Porto has helped us continue to develop our relationships with the Big Imaginations venue and in the North West we will play 6 venues

• Builds on our seed commissioning partners support. Cheshire Rural Touring have continued to be great champions of the project commissioning us to create 2 pages of content for their rural touring paper during lock down, supporting the activity day at Wild Rumpus (see below) and booking two slots on the tour (Chester Arts Space and Tarvin Community Centre). Likewise Carn to Cove continue to support the project and have booked two slots on the tour for Mousehole and Launceston. The show is also visiting RWCMD Richard Burton Theatre who also seed funded the first R&D and hosted the audio tales on their web site.

• Builds on our previous success with The Mystery of the Raddlesham Mumps. We are delighted to be returning to a number of key venues including The Egg (Bath), Theatre by the Lake (Keswick) and Z Arts.

• But this work has also enabled us to develop some new relationships with Stephen Joseph Theatre (Scarborough), Space 2 (Theatre Royal Norwich), Unity (Liverpool), Mercury (Colchester) and of course our production week host Wells Maltings.

All in all we have been able to develop a full ten week tour across Autumn 22, subject to funding. The full tour is listed in Appendix Two.

A REVIEW

As in 2021, we arranged to visit a number of schools across the UK on and around World Poetry Day. This time the sessions were delivered by Matthew Linley (producer), Murray Lachlan Young (lead artist and writer) and Sangita Lakhannpal (mythology advisor).

Murray performed some of his own work, as well as reading one of his favourite poems. Sangita performed some ancient poetry by female poets from India. In between we introduced Atom and Luna, took questions and set the children a takeaway task!

This year we introduced a session for home schoolers.

“Thank you so much for the poetry Zoom this morning, the children absolutely loved it. After the session they were all so excited and we chatted for at least 20 minutes afterwards about what they learned and enjoyed.

They loved Murray’s poetry readings and found him very interesting and funny. They were amazed at how many poems he had written and it helped some children to realise that they could write lots and lots before they may find their ‘killer’ poem. They are really excited to create some images of Iffly Sney too.

It was so wonderful to have Sangita on the call and the class were so impressed when she sang to them and also introduced them to Indian poetry. The children now said they would like to discover more poems from India and other cultures too - they were so inspired.

The tips section at the end was also great and really supported all our resilience and ‘building learning power’ learning we do as a school. Reinforcing to the children to be themselves and write when inspired and not to compare themselves or their poetry and writing to anyone else.

Overall it was absolutely wonderful and I cannot say thank you enough. Having been teaching for ten years I can say it was one of the most informative, exciting and well put together sessions for the children I have been involved in. What a wonderful experience you provided for the children and it is sure to be a highlight of the year.” (Teacher feedback)

Key Learning

• This is a format which seems to be working well, and providing value to schools.

• As we go forward into the tour we are looking to run both zoom and in person visits in tandem

• There is an opportunity for us going forward to broaden the number of schools we engage with through this programme, and for us to pre record an offer for schools from the tour.

Murray Lachlan Young at one of the school zoom sessions for World Poetry Day. Photo credit St Benedicts School

WRABNESS R&D A REVIEW

* Wrabness R&D: the full team. (From L to R) Nina Hajiyianni (director), Alex Fairley (performer), Murray Lachlan Young (writer), Bek Palmer (designer), Becca Bindang (performer), Chris Warner (composer and sound design), Matthew Linley (producer), Farrell Cox, Fran Burgoyne (performers).

The Wrabness R&D took place 5th 8th September at Wrabness Village Hall, with much work outside and also a visit to Wix and Wrabness School. There were 5 working sessions, plus 1 photography/film and media session, plus 1 schools session and 1 public facing foraging walk.

*

*Photos by Luke Witcomb

*Nina Hajiyianni (director) in discussion with Bek Palmer (designer)

*Becca Bindang, Farrell Cox, Fran Burgoyne (performers) *

*Becca Bindang, Farrell Cox and Fran Burgoyne (Performers)

Lora Aziz (Forager in Residence) leading a community foraging walk in Wrabness Photo Ben Wilmott

Alex Fairley Scott (performer), Matthew Linley (producer), Lora Aziz (forager in residence), Nina Hajiyianni (director) and Bek Palmer (designer)

Having established the story in the first R&D (Wivenhoe) this second R&D was able to focus on how we tell the story both in terms of performance and in terms of design. We considered and tested Bek’s white card design.

We were able to test and play with some musical ideas he has being developing as our composer and sound associate. (In the schools session we even taught the children The Mushroom Song so the school and cast heard the song together for the first time!). The session also allowed us to test a couple of potential new performers to join the company - Fran Burgoyne and Alex Scott.

Key learning

• That the story worked

• And that what we have developed effectively over the last 3 years is very exciting. This is the note that our producer Matthew Linley sent venue partners the following note which just about sums it up:

“We've just had a great few days on Atom and Luna in deepest darkest North Essex...in Wrabness Village Hall which was lovely! Murray (writer) and Nina (director obvs) were quite literally on fire, sparring with each other at a rate of knots which was phenomenal to watch especially on the Friday where we seemed to motor through the show and solve an incredible amount of stuff, despite the heat!

Our story involves a giant hare (puppet), a transforming wolf, a screeching bird and a flight of butterflies (more puppets). There’s also sizzling mushrooms (oh and of course a mushroom song written by our composer Chris Warren) and some great performances emerging from our cast.

As well as the school visit we also went foraging with our Resident Forager Lora Aziz. One of our actors tweeted 'every R&D should have a foraging walk', and another tweeted this lovely line about the show: ' The Chronicles of Atom and Luna a beautiful blend of fairytale and nature', which I might just start using!”

Actions Going Forward

• Murray will develop a new version of the script for rehearsal based on the findings from the R&D

• Bek will develop the design for the performance, ready for final build

• We will (hopefully) go into rehearsal in September 2022 for our tour in Oct/Nov 22

Bek Palmer White Card design for The Chronicles of Atom and Luna scale model. Photo and design credit Bek Palmer

WILD RUMPUS ACTIVITY DAY A REVIEW

Our final public test event as part Atom and Luna phase 2 was an activity day at Wild Rumpus Whirligig Woods, promoted by one of our original seed commissioners Cheshire Rural Touring in association with Wild Rumpus. We designed a session which brought together and tested some of the participatory elements of the Atom and Luna project, and road tested some of the wrap around activity we hope to deliver as part of our Autumn tour in 2022. The sessions included:

• A game of Old Mother Redbeard’s footsteps (a rehearsal game)

• A foraging walk with Lora

• Murray telling the story of Atom and Luna (am) and a performance of Modern Cautionary Tales for Children (pm)

• The opportunity to take a story for a walk - using silent disco headphones and episode 6 of Tales from the Forest

• An activity table including our story phone

The event also allowed Murray (writer), Lora (forager in residence) and Matthew (producer) to spend the night together in the woods, experiencing life (in a small way) like Old Mother Redbeard! Much creative discussion, planning and exploration happened over dinner and into the evening!

One mum with autistic sons told us after the session how much she had enjoyed it, and how special it was to have an activity that both her boys could engage in and enjoy throughout without being stopped.

Children’s art work created during the Atom and Luna activity day with Wild Rumpus

Key learning

• Probably the first time the ‘take a story for a walk worked’. Worked because it came at the end of the activity (so introduced to Atom and Luna) and obviously the right environment

• The foraging walk have been working throughout but Lora was very strong at linking her finds to Old Mother Redbeard and our story

• The overall session provided lots of inspiration for wrap around offers for Autumn 22

• It also effectively tested the range of offers the project could provide to festivals, outdoor theatres and so on. Through the Wild Rumpus Activity Day we got a chance to test an overall offer that blends foraging walks, taking a story for a walk, games and of course (ultimately) the performance

Lora leading another public foraging walk this time with families and children as part of Wild Rumpus

Wild Rumpus photos Matthew Linley

PARTNERSHIPS

As a small company which at its heart is a loose partnership between three creative practitioners (Murray, Nina and Matthew) our partnerships continue to be critical to our work.

Our two core partnerships our bedrock if you like are with our in association partners Theatre Porto (formally Action Transport Theatre) and Eastern Angles. Their continued support, championing and practical help is utterly invaluable.

During this period, Theatre Porto have:

• Donated to us the time of our director Nina Hajiyianni

• Supported us financially with sees support of £500, as well as committing to take the tour in Autumn 22 with a small guarantee.

• Helped us to continue to build our links with key North West partners, particularly Big Imaginations.

• In kind support valued at £1000 including general support, loaning of props, education, marketing etc.

Eastern Angles have:

• Supported us financially with seed support of £500 as well as committing to take the Autumn 22 tour with a small guarantee.

• Helped us to build our links with East based venues and partners. As well as opening the show in the East we now have a strong East leg of the tour.

• In kind support valued at £1000 including general support, loaning of props, education, equipment and marketing support

• Introduced us to their Associate Director Scott Hurran who directed our Colchester weekend

As noted above, this year;s work has seen us able to develop our relationship with some of our seed funders (in particular Cheshire Rural Touring) and introduced us to some new potential partners (for example Wild Rumpus). Over the year of activity we have also began to develop partnerships with a range of other organisations including University of Essex and ROH Bridge.

MARKETING DEVELOPMENT WORK

We said in our application that we wanted to grow our networks on both social media and through our newsletter to develop a broader online audience.

Over the last 12 months we have grown our subscriber numbers by 350%, our Facebook followers by 72% and introduced the company twitter and Instagram channels.

Perhaps most importantly, Atom and Luna Part 2 has allowed us to have consistent marketing support across the year which as well as growth in our mailing list and socials, has seen us run strategic campaigns, develop key contents, test different approaches and become clearer about the marketing approach for Atom and Luna the touring show. This work has been vital to our continued growth and development

Mailing List Growth

We started Aug 2021 with 675 subscribers and over the period of this project have now grown this to 2,364 subscribers.

We currently have a 27 39% open rate (which is very good). The highest rate was for our tree planting campaign in the run up to Christmas 2021 (39%).

The Explorer Newsletter

In line with our commitment to encouraging children's creativity and using their ideas and thoughts in our process, we have introduced a monthly Explorer email.

This monthly email is sent to all subscribers and includes a foraging task from our Forager in residence, latest news from the team, what’s on and creative tasks from the team.

So far there have been 6 Explorer newsletters and an extra 7 since Aug 2021 and we will continue to release the Explorer email through to the end of 2022.

Social Media Growth

Facebook:

Since August 2021 we have increased our Facebook page followers from 472 to 811 and total page likes have increased from 451 to 760

Instagram: Currently we have 141 followers (from 0) and since April 2022 (Instagram only provides data in maximum 90 day chunks) the account grew by 3.6% of followers, we had 96 content interactions and reached 152 accounts.

Twitter:

Currently we have 148 followers (from 0) and we’re following 197 other accounts. In the last 28 days ( again Twitter doesn’t let you look back between the current date and August 21) we’ve 1,559 profile visits, we’ve gained 13 followers and received 5,016 tweet impressions. Our most recent top performing tweet was from our R&D media day and foraging walk in Wrabness, we took photos of the team doing their work and it seemed to really resonate with audiences. This had 44 engagements and reached 655 impressions.

Survey Data

• We took the time to survey out subscribers to find out a bit more about their engagement, a few headlines provided below:

Ethnicity 93% white / 2.7% mixed / 2.7% Asian / 1% Black

26% identify as a D/deaf or disabled, or have a long term health condition

78% had children under 18

49% had engaged in our audio tales and 10% our AR game 72% were interested in new content

- 70% wanted to learn more about the stage show

- Reasons for signing up (multiple selection):

- I'd heard about / interest in the stories of Atom and Luna - 39.3%

- The activities for young people - 37.7%

- The competition prize - 45.9%

The illustrations 37.7%0

- The work of Murray Lachlan Young - 8.7%

The work of Action Transport Theatre 7.7%

- The work of Eastern Angles - 3.3%

Key Learning

• Our pre Christmas competition (where we offered a National Trust membership a very complementary brand) was highly successful at increasing our mailing list memberships.

• We were able to retain many of these by providing (and investing) in regular quality content

• We have been able through this ‘testing’ phase to develop strong relationships with our existing partners, and with the new venues who have come on line and formed the potential tour. The joy of a cross platform project, supported by our marketing team of Emma and Rachel and then Ben, means that we have content to share and crucially the capacity to develop these relationships. Hopefully this will pay off as we move into the touring phase.

• Those strong relationships have meant we already have marketing plans in place with many of our venues for the tour.

• We have been using Bek Palmer’s stunning illustrations as marketing collateral (and core image). Whilst these are beautiful they are perhaps not striking or immediate enough to grab attention in the current age. The illustrations too perhaps work less well for our target age range (7+) and it needs to be remembered that the illustrations reflect a particular moment in the first Chronicle and were not commissioned to ‘sell’ the theatre show.

What we are not seeing yet

• Is translation of the increase into mailing list and social growth into actual sales, something which may have been impacted by Covid.

• Given COVID, and the challenges of the theatre market this is perhaps unsurprising, especially as you consider the highly localised and low key events we have been running.

• Hopefully as we move into the touring phase this will change!

• But as with the comments above it suggests we need to look again at how we are communicating the show visually

Actions going forward as we move into The Chronicles of Atom and Luna tour

• Look to build the mailing list again around the launch of the tour with another competition.

• Create a new core image which combines live photography (possible as we have been able to work with the cast through this R&D) with illustration. The new image will be modern, bright, energetic and adventure.

APPENDIX ONE - THE CREATIVE TEAM

15 creatives and 7 team members have been involved in this stage of the project

The Creative Team

Artist and role Days

Murray Lachlan Young Writer

Matthew Linley Producer

Nina Hajiyianni Director

Bek Palmer Designer

Sangita Lakenpal Mythology Advisor

Lora Aziz Forager in Residence

Chris Warren Composer

Scott Hurran

Director Colchester Weekend

Tom Campe

Performer Colchester Weekend

20 days writing 2 days outreach work 3 days zoom R&D 2 days in person R&D 2 days live performance Total 29 days

2 days outreach work 7 days R&D 2 days live performance 1 day Regatta 3 days Colchester weekend 21 days paid project management and development 16 days worked voluntarily

Total 52 days

7 days R&D 5 days dramaturgical support Total 12 days

7 days R&D 6 days design development Total 13 days

3 days R&D 2 days outreach Total 5 days

2 days R&D 2 days live performance 3 days activity development Total 7 days

2 days R&D 3 days composing Total 5 days

Rehearsal 3 days Total 3 days

2 days rehearsal 2 days performance

Becca Bindang Performer

Farrell Cox Performer

Fran Burgoyne Performer

Total 4 days

3 days R&D 3 days R&D Total 6 days

3 days R&D 3 days R&D Total 6 days

3 days R&D Total 3 days

Alex Scott Fairley Performer 3 days R&D Total 3 days

Sameera Bowers Film Maker 2 days Total 2 days

Warehouse Digital Technical Support 3 days Total 3 days

Role Days

Emma Martin

Marketing

Rachel McCall

Social Media Marketing

Ben Wilmott

Social Media Marketing

Mitch Donaldson

Assistant Producer

Approx. 18 20 days over the period

Approx. 15 days over the period (shared between Rachel and Ben)

1 day Colchester R&D

Colchester Weekend Assistant Producer 3 days

Serena Fyvie

Laura Marshall

Colchester Weekend Assistant Producer 6 week placement 30 days across the first half of the project

Isabell Scott

Colchester Weekend Assistant Producer 3 days

The Core Team

APPENDIX TWO - THE PROPOSED TOUR

One of the key successes of The Chronicles of Atom and Luna part 2 has been the development of a substantial tour for Autumn 22. The full tour (which is subject to a funding bid ) is as follows:

Production Week

30th September Wells Maltings 1pm & 7pm

1st October Wells Maltings 2pm

Week One

4th October Carn to Cove travel day

5th October Carn to Cove Launceston

6th October Carn to Cove Mousehole

7th October get in day The Egg, Bath from 2pm plus BSL rehearsal

8th October The Egg performances at 11.30 (BSL) and 3pm

9th October The Egg performances at 11.30 (relaxed) and 3pm

Week Two

12th October The Quay, Sudbury 6.30pm

13th October The Sir John Mills Theatre 1pm and 6.00pm

14th October The Sir John Mills Theatre 10am and 1pm. Get Out

Get In to Space 2, 6pm to 10pm

15th October Space 2 Norwich 11am and 2.30pm

16th October Space 2 Norwich 11am and 2.30pm

Week Three

18th October Get in Action Transport Theatre

19th October schools performance ATT 1pm and Guest performance 7pm

20th October 1 school at 10am (followed by climate change conference)

21st October 2 x schools 10am and 1pm (then get out)

22nd October Z Arts, Manchester. 2pm (BSL)

23rd October ATT public performance at 2pm Week Four

25th October SJT Scarborough get in and show at 7pm

26th October – SJT Scarborough 2 shows at 2pm and 7pm

27th October travel day

28th October Theatre by the Lake get in and show at 7pm

29th October Theatre by the Lake 2 shows at 2pm and 7pm

Week Five

1st November RWCMD 1 show at 2.30pm

2nd November day off/travel day

3rd November St Mary’s Creative Space Chester (Cheshire Rural Touring) - tbc tomandsarafrith@gmail.com

4th November Tarvin Community Centre (Cheshire Rural Touring) 7pm thearts@tarvincommunitycentre.org

5th November Unity Theatre, Liverpool 14.30pm

Week Six Holiday Week Week Seven

14th November Wrabness and Wix School (time tbc)

15th November Cleveland Road Primary School (time tbc)

16th November - Brightlingsea Community Association times tbc

17th November get in Colchester Mercury

18th November schools performances Colchester venue times tbc

19th November public performances Colchester Mercury at 11am

20th November public performances at Colchester Mercury at 1pm

End of Tour