The Storm Whale adaptation charms visually but feels overly solemn

The Storm Whale, an adaptation of Benji Davies’s 2013 picture book and its sequel, is staged as a seaside tale about a boy, Noi, and his father, opening with a romantic ode to the briny air and swooping gulls. Lydia Denno’s designs create an idyllic home with colourful bunting, sand on the doorstep and a stripy lighthouse.

Emily Essery plays Noi, Richard Lounds his father and Géhane Strehler his friend Flo; director Matt Aston’s adaptation, for children aged four to eight, explores how solitude need not mean loneliness and sketches a fuller family backstory including the mother Noi has lost. The reviewer found the script touching and evocative but said its earnest messages grow repetitive and the dialogue can be wearyingly solemn, and that Flo’s midlife-crisis references will mean little to young audiences.

Highlights noted include Keith Frederick’s squishy whale puppet with Sue Dacre’s puppet direction, Hayley Del Harrison’s tempest choreography to Julian Butler’s jig, stirring sea shanties and Jason Salvin’s creative lighting; only one of Noi’s six cats is a fully realised puppet, and the cats are cutely named after coastal towns, with the marmalade one called Sandwich.

The review also says the show lacks the offbeat humour of comparable family pieces and that its two set pieces—Noi returning the whale to the water and the later rescue of his father at sea—are too brief.

Key Topics

Culture, Benji Davies, Matt Aston, Emily Essery, Keith Frederick, Little Angel Studios