Gerald Durrell "...I traveled with only those items that I thought necessary to relieve the tedium of a long journey: four books on natural history, a butterfly net, a dog, and a jam-jar full of caterpillars all in imminent danger of turning into chrysalids..." Young actor Eugene Simon, who plays 12 year-old Gerald Durrell, has been seen previously as the young Casanova in the 2005 Heath Ledger film about the famous lover. He also played young Felix in Alpha Male and has appeared on British television in My Dad's the Prime Minister and Murder in Suburbia.