This fourth show from Sparkle and Dark employs live music, various forms of puppetry and a ‘real’ central performer to tell a haunting if somewhat confusing fable of lost innocence. The elements are combined to create a coherent and engaging aesthetic, and there is a solid competence throughout the various skills deployed, but despite my best efforts to stay focused the narrative thread soon slipped from my grasp in the welter of metaphors within tales within parables.
The show begins in earnest with the narration of an Old Man puppet with shiny black eyes, a basketry back, and a sonorous voice somewhere between Richard Burton and the lead singer from the Arctic Monkeys. He recounts the tragic tale of a human girl who, despite her mother’s warnings, journeys through some mystical gates to a land where children live in fear of an adult army seeking to steal their hearts to use… in the manufacture of nuclear weapons. I am not averse to the sensory pleasures of discontinuity and collage, and there is enough here to keep the eye and ear engaged, but I ultimately sensed I had lost a plot and missed a point I was expected to follow.
This is not to suggest there isn’t a good show nestling within the production that might be released with some diligent paring down, structural adjustment and added helpings of humour to counteract the lashings of earnest sincerity. The girl is played with archetypal elfin innocence, and the puppet characters she meets are brought to life with diligent skill. The design elements are also strong, with an all-white set comprised of connecting shadow screens, a large white book, and forest stumps that later transform into city walls. The puppets, performances and musical accompaniment are all detailed and considered, with the production values generally suggesting a seriousness and ambition that should carry the company forwards, if they can clarify their storytelling.