Snick & Willow, an animated children’s series built around cricket, friendship and cultural exchange, is seeking to strengthen the connection between India and Australia through storytelling.
It is an Australian-made animated children’s series built around cricket, friendship and cultural exchange, with its central characters — Snick, an Indian boy, and Willow, an Australian girl — using the sport as a bridge between their two worlds. Through humour, adventure and friendship, the series aims to introduce children to another country and culture while highlighting the enduring people-to-people ties between Australia and India. The project was inspired by creator Ken Cantrill’s experience in India, where he saw cricket bringing people together across communities.
“Snick & Willow has been an extraordinary journey. What began as an idea to create a children’s animated series built around cricket has grown into something far more meaningful — a story about friendship, adventure and the powerful connection between Australia and India,” Cantrill told The Australia Today. He said the involvement of cricket figures including Lord Ian Botham, Pat Cummins, Bharat Sundaresan and Summer Warne had been particularly meaningful, bringing different connections to the sport and adding authenticity to the project.
A major milestone for the series has been its partnership with Cricket Australia. Cantrill said cricket is “one of the great bonds between Australia and India” and that Snick & Willow provides an opportunity to introduce that relationship to a new generation through storytelling, humour, culture and adventure. The series is also expanding its cultural focus, with two animated shorts celebrating Diwali and Christmas being produced with support from the 2026 Maitri Grants Program, administered by the Centre for Australia-India Relations.
The two Maitri-supported productions are scheduled for release in November 2026 and will use children’s storytelling to explore Australian and Indian cultures. The project is being developed with Indian animation studio RedGod Studios, with Yukfoo supporting pre-production, design and production supervision.
Cantrill said the project’s ultimate ambition is to create something children in Australia, India and around the world can connect with while showing how sport can bring people and cultures closer together. “We want Australian children to become curious about India, Indian children to see Australia as a friend,” he said, describing friendship, adventure, teamwork, culture and cricket as the values at the heart of the series.
That vision was also reflected in a recent round-table discussion in Melbourne during IFFM 2026, which brought together Cantrill and an Indian delegation to discuss filmmaking, co-production, cultural exchange and creative collaboration. The delegation was an initiative of Jay Shah, CEO of Indiqa, and led by Shri Prabhat, Additional Secretary, Ministry of Information & Broadcasting, Government of India, with Sreerag Mukundan, Gouri Nair of NFDC and Satyaprakash Upadhyay of WAVES Bazaar also participating. Discussions included opportunities around IFFI and WAVES — extending the India-Australia conversation from cricket and children’s storytelling into the broader screen and creative industries.
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