A child's view of naughty parents

Hannah Tolich plays Lucy, a 4-year-old, in the twisted comedy Mr Marmalade - but no way is it child's play, says director Michael Hurst.

Tolich, who played a pre-teen bounding in and out of scenes in The Women, does not leave the stage in Mr Marmalade.

"Hannah is playing a lead role in this piece. The story is told entirely through her," says Hurst. "That's a huge journey for her."

Written by Noah Haidle and fresh from a run on Broadway, Mr Marmalade puts a new twist on adult behaviour - or misbehaviour.

It looks at the world through the eyes of Lucy and 5-year-old Larry, New Jersey's youngest suicide survivor.

The play is named after Lucy's imaginary friend, a workaholic with a personal assistant, a propensity for manic behaviour and a substance-abuse problem.

Larry (Paolo Rotondo) is Lucy's new real-life friend who is having a few problems coping with his father's re-marriage.

Together they do typical kid things. They squirt cans of whipped cream and "easy cheese" into their mouths, they play house, and doctors and nurses. Lucy is the organiser while Larry, in his own cheerfully melancholic way, is content to do as she instructs.

Underlying the games are their cutting observations of the world around them - one run by adults behaving more like children than the kids they are supposed to be raising.

Lucy's recently divorced mother works by day and dates by night, leaving her daughter with babysitters fond of daytime soaps to keep the 4-year-old quiet; Larry's teenage step-brother picks on him mercilessly.

Hurst says that far from detracting from the story, making the two lead characters children is a novel approach which differentiates Mr Marmalade from other stories about adult relationships.

"Everything is given extra poignancy and humour because the kids can see and say things adults can't. At the end of the day, I think it's a play about the human spirit - about how resilient it is and how we do actually need each other."

Tolich is enjoying her role as Lucy because it is so different to portraying an adult or even an older girl.

"My character in The Women was an older child which is very different to playing a 4-year-old where the thought processes are that much simpler," she says. "You can't analyse things too closely - you have the lines in your head and just go with it."

Co-star Paolo Rotondo agrees. "With kids, they say what they mean. You can't think, 'OK, the line says I'm happy; now what's the subtext behind that?' because there isn't any. You realise how little we do as adults that is not over-laid with complexity."

Both childless, they appreciate Hurst sharing stories about his sons, now 6 and 9.

"When children try to lie, they are usually very transparent," he says. "You'll say, 'have you brushed your teeth?' and there's a pause, the eyes go down and there's hesitation when they say, 'yesssss' and you know they have not brushed their teeth."

Mr Marmalade also stars Andrew Laing, Paul Barrett, Lauren Jackson and Charlie McDermott.  At Silo Theatre, Mar 8-Apr 15