Things I Learned from SpongeBob
4 min read // Published by Young People’s Theatre, August 2022
Written by: Holly Fishlock
Pictured: The full cast of The SpongeBob Musical
With the performance season of The SpongeBob Musical well over, we wanted to know what students have taken away from this show. We asked our cast what SpongeBob has taught them, and we received some amazing responses.
Jackson Archer – Plankton
Being a part of SpongeBob has taught me countless amounts of important things in life, between relationships, shared experiences and achieving goals of our own. On top of that, I believe that both in general and from each show it also taught extremely important factors about our ocean’s marine environments and ecosystems. With the brilliant stage and set designs utilised for grand performances, they are made of common forms of human waste that greatly impact the ocean and its inhabitants. Major examples of ocean pollutants include straws, non-reusable coffee cups, softened foam boards, fishing nets and soft plastics within children’s toys. All of which were sourced onstage from local beaches in Australia or from wastage from YPT Families. I believe that both the performance of the show and the spectacle of the staging of the production together lend themselves to contributing to the awareness of the current state of our seas and oceans, which is one of the most important impacts you can make on the younger generations of Newcastle.
Amber Watts – Oscar
Spongebob has taught me to be grateful for the littlest of things because you never know when your last day will be. It’s also taught me that home isn’t just where you live- it can be a person and in this case, too many to even count
Billie Tiffenright – Daisy Discuss
Spongebob has taught me that positivity is one of the key factors in success because when something that is out of your control happens you can either let it be ( and in Spongebob’s case everyone would have died) or you can try really hard to fix it. Still, they wouldn’t have gotten far without the constant positive force making them keep going.
Miloš O’Donohue – Mr Krabs
The colourful set of SpongeBob was quite eye-opening in terms of environmental impact. Seeing everything from the large nets cast over the scaffolding to the bottles and plastics scattered across originally I thought nothing of it. It was only in retrospect I realised that every single part of the set is something that has and inevitably will be discarded into the ocean, even the fridge that was used, I’m certain there are fridges lying somewhere at the bottom of the Mariana Trench. It’s made me think, and hopefully the audience too, about what does in fact end up in our world’s beautiful seas and oceans. Instead of seeing bottles and fridges be tossed into it, I’d much rather recycle them in any way I can. SpongeBob and its amazing set have really taught me about the environment and just how much it has been impacted
Ava White – Sandy
Spongebob has taught me to never give up, even when the whole world seems to be against me. It taught me to be unapologetically myself and not to let anyone decide your fate for you
Ruby Burford – Coral Chorus
I think SpongeBob taught me to accept myself for who I am because everyone’s special in their own way. And always work together. Because if you do great things can happen. Like in SpongeBob you could even stop a volcano! One last thing, we need to do more to clean up our oceans. I saw that myself on world ocean day when we were cleaning up our Beach. It inspired me to start picking up rubbish when my family and I go for a walk.
Eva Reynolds – Chorus Chorus
Spongebob has taught me never to give up, to keep my eye on my goals and be nice to everyone.
Caitlin Maher – Perch Perkins
SpongeBob has helped me realise that recycling and reusing items is much easier than I thought, such as using old items from cast members for the set and for costumes. I very much admire the directing team for keeping this as a priority throughout the production and think that it definitely brought a new and exciting element to the show.
Jensen Nicholson – Stevie Swordfish
You need to act on your convictions. If SpongeBob hadn’t tried to stop the volcano, everyone would be dead. When the news of the impending eruption was announced, instead of acting collectively, everyone else was thinking it was every man for themselves, but SpongeBob worked for everybody.
Bridget Ponman – SpongeBob
SpongeBob taught me to just keep my eye on the prize and to keep going even when I doubt myself. It also taught me the value of teamwork. It has also taught me the importance of keeping our oceans clean. When the cast participated in World Ocean day, it didn’t occur to me just how much rubbish was being put into the ocean until we all came back with buckets full of rubbish. It was really eye-opening to see just how much damage humans are doing to the ocean, and made me more proactive in researching ways we can stop this from happening.
Takira Coleman – Mayor
SpongeBob taught me that sometimes it is okay to think that a day will be great for no reason. To trust and believe that it will be. Also, the recycled set has impacted me greatly in the show because it has taught me that all things can be given a new meaning no matter how old and broken it is, they can be turned into something amazing.
Lauren Brown – Remi Ray
SpongeBob is an experience I’ll never forget, not only was it a brilliant musical to be a part of but it also created awareness about the environment and how we can help the environment as well as how much we collectively can affect the environment. I would say that the set used for SpongeBob really demonstrated what the environment is affected by. Seeing SpongeBob and being a part of SpongeBob has inspired me to be more environmentally friendly by picking up rubbish wherever I can and encouraging others to help the environment as well.
A huge thank you to all the audiences that came and saw The SpongeBob Musical. YPT is incredibly grateful for the support given to this production. We really did have the #bestdayever
