Year 10 student Ahana tells us about the Drama department’s recent trip to the West End to see ‘The Life of Pi’ adapted by playwright Lolita Chakrabarti from the novel by Yann Martel.
I thoroughly enjoyed the play which was unpredictable and exhilarating in numerous aspects. The play follows the trials and tribulations faced by the protagonist Pi Patel as he tries to survive alone at sea. His miraculous survival comes at a terrible cost and the play opens with the traumatised Pi in hospital in Mexico. The story is told in flashbacks, as Pi explains how he begins his journey across the ocean when his family flee political upheaval in India and set out to start a new life in Canada. They bring with them all the animals from their family business, a zoo, and the best part of the play, which made it truly sensational was the use of animal puppets. There were life-sized puppets of each of the menagerie of animals, from cheeky meerkats to the menacing hyena. Controlled by multiple puppeteers, which moved in a natural manner, the puppets truly added an extra dimension to the play – there was even red cloth pulled out of the puppets when the animals were killed for food.
The play is staged in a proscenium arch theatre which had a very intriguing set. For example, parts of the stage lifted up and rotated to form the shape of the boat and the trap door out of which characters appeared onto the boat! This was one of the many parts of the play which kept me on the edge of my seat. I was intrigued when the two panels which made up the back of the set, flipped around to reveal Pi’s zoo full of puppet animals. The flipping of the set made the play feel more immersive. Later in the play, the panels flipped around again but this time it revealed a whole marketplace, in an extraordinarily detailed two-tier set which later became the ship.
After Pi recounted his magical childhood learning how to care for the animals, the action moved forward to partway through the journey across the Pacific. A huge storm hits the boat and the production used lots of stunning special effects, including a map and ocean being projected onto the floor. This created a tense visual spectacle as Pi was separated from his family, swept overboard and into a lifeboat.
Several animals swim onto Pi’s boat and are the only survivors of the shipwreck. Pi is stranded at sea alone with a Hyena, Black and White (their zebra), Richard Parker (their adult Bengal tiger) and Orange Juice (their orangutan). Then a series of heart-wrenching scenes show Pi starting to come to terms with the harsh realities of life.
The novel the play is adapted from is very philosophical and asks many thought-provoking questions about whether humans and animals are similar. Pi tells stories which sound far-fetched and fantastical. At last, only Pi and Richard Parker are left alive. Pi then had to try to reclaim the boat if he was to stand any chance of survival. As a Hindu who has been brought up vegetarian as part of his faith, with his food stores quickly diminishing, Pi was forced to make the difficult choice of killing a turtle for food and water.
Moments of the play were surreal as well as comical and Pi bonds with the tiger Richard Parker, who starts to become more human and speaks with a suave French accent. The play contains a shocking twist, where Pi starts to tell a different story, where people are in the lifeboat with him, rather than animals. It is revealed that the orangutang was his mother, and the hyena and zebra were members of the ship’s crew. At the climax, the acting was incredibly moving as Pi asked if the characters listening to his story preferred the one with animals or the one with humans.
Overall, I really enjoyed this chance to see ‘Life of Pi’ in a fantastic theatre environment. I learnt a lot about how to engage a large audience to bring a theatre piece to life. I can’t wait to attend the next theatre show!
Ahana, Year 10
