Life of Pi

(Critique en français : Cliquez ici)

Book: Yann MARTEL

Director: Max WEBSTER

Playwrighter: Lolita CHAKRABARTI

Dramaturg: Jack BRADLEY

Composer: Andrew T. MACKAY

Set and costumes designer: Tim HATLEY

Lightning designer: Tim LUTKIN

Sound Designer: Carolyn DOWNING

Associate set designer: Ross EDWARDS

Associate director: Hannah BANISTER

Costume supervisor: Sabrina CUNIBERTO

Hair and wigs: Campbell Young Associates

Associate lightning designers: Elliot SMITH

Associate sound designers: Rob BETTLE and Sam CLARKSON for Sound Quiet Time

Associate puppet designer: Caroline BOWMANATE

Props supervisors: Ryan O’CONNER

Casting: Polly JERROLD

Starring:

at Wyndham’s Theatre until 15th january 2023

Don’t miss out on this gem of a play! Life of Pi is a hymn to the beauty of the world. Fauna and flora take on an indescribable aura. Everything is deified. And if the story has nothing to do with Homer’s Odyssey, we find references to mythology just as it brings us back to Noah’s Ark or Robinson Crusoe.

First of all, we are seduced by the strikingly real movements of each animal. The puppeteers behind each of them are not hidden but are forgotten. However, if you look at them a little, they are acting as much as any other comedian. They don’t hide their talent behind a head or a paw: they are the animal with all the expressions and cries that are proper to it. One can only think of other shows that demand the same requirement: The Lion King the Musical or War Horse. Each time, it is the same conclusion: it blows away.

Then, the set is full of ingenuity and the stage design reveals many surprises.

The light is impressive for a rendering all in voluptuous nuances. The coup de maître lies in the mapping which succeeds, in addition, the challenge of not letting see projections of images on the artists. The discreet music rocks us like the rolling of the waves on a lifeboat. It’s as if music and lights were in sync.

If you have seen Ang LEE’s film and are wondering how to translate so much beauty from the screen to the stage, you will not be disappointed. Life of Pi surpasses the film by far! The visual effects are amazing. It is a heavenly pleasure for the eyes and the heart.

However, we regret that the meerkats’ island is a moment that is a bit overhauled even if we must admit that it is not essential.

The dreamlike universe of Pi is well present. It is not a live show, it is a living poem.

Finally, an experiment to do at home: does a banana float?

A fractal masterpiece!

Synospis

After a cargo ship sinks in the middle of the vast Pacific Ocean, a sixteen year-old boy named Pi is stranded on a lifeboat with four other survivors – a hyena, a zebra, an orangutan, and a Royal Bengal tiger. Time is against them, nature is harsh, who will survive?

Based on one of the most extraordinary and best-loved works of fiction – Life of Pi is the smash hit adaptation of an epic journey of endurance and hope.

Copyright: Johan Persson

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