About Us
What is TVY?
Though Theatre for the Very Young (TVY) is fairly new to the US American theatre field, it has been produced internationally for about 35 years. It is generally defined as theatre for people under 6 years old.
Kerfuffle is an award-winning midwestern theatre and dance company devoted to creating aesthetically and emotionally engaging performances for children ages 0-6 years old. Founded in 2015, Kerfuffle centers young children as major creative partners in the development of new work and shares playful, multi-sensory performances in museums, libraries, parks, and other nontraditional spaces. Children’s imagination is at the center of Kerfuffle’s process. In order to understand what engages, delights, and surprises children, Kerfuffle’s plays are developed through creative drama workshops where young people create stories, characters, and worlds in collaboration with adult artists. Kerfuffle is a registered 501(c)3 organization and is the 2020 recipient of the Zeta Phi Eta-Winifred Ward Outstanding New Children's Theatre Company Award through the American Alliance for Theatre and Education.
Each Kerfuffle production has two components:
1. Kerfuffle artists facilitate creative drama residencies in community spaces such as preschools, libraries, or museums to generate ideas for a show. During the residencies, Kerfuffle artists explore and play with children using improvisation, storytelling, movement and visual art to explore a central topic while observing what excites, engages, moves, and interests the children.
2. A performance residency of an original show in a non traditional theatre space: a local park, a library, a museum, a zoo, a co-op community space, and so on.
In short, we partner directly WITH young children to create original plays FOR young children! Kerfuffle centers children as major creative partners in the development process of the plays they see.
PRODUCTION HISTORY
2015 - Company founded
2016 - The Caterpillar’s Footprint, Mesa AZ
2016 - ShadowPlay, Tempe AZ
2017 - wonderwander, Tempe, AZ
2018 - The Caterpillar’s Footprint, Lincoln, NE
2018 - Nested, Omaha, NE
2019 - Goose and Gert, Omaha NE
2019 - Firefly, Omaha NE
2020 - Winner, Zeta Phi Eta-Winifred Ward Outstanding New Children's Theatre Company Award
2021 - Goose and Gert, Chicago IL
2021 - The Conductors, Chicagoland, IL
2022 - Toad Hall, Potsdam, NY
2022 - The Conductors, Chicago IL
2023 - The Conductors, Chicago IL
2023 - Kerfuffle obtains 501(c)3 nonprofit status
2024 - The Conductors, Chicago & Bloomington-Normal
2024 - Toddler Hiking Club: An Imaginative Nature Walk, Chicago IL
2024 - Bookworms, Chicagoland, IL & Thurston County, NE
2025 - The Conductors, Lincoln, NE