God plays dice, Death tells stories – at least they do in this surreal grown up fairy tale.
Three young lovers stumble their way into the forest with talk of marriage and illicit affairs, only to engage in a series of storytelling adventures to try to tempt down a fourth villager who has discovered a crown in a tree – after being frightened up there by a bear.
Don’t worry if that mash up of the Brothers Grimm and Shakespeare sounds slightly confusing, just relax into Lewis Garvey’s playful and richly textured script, which also throws in the tall looming figure of Death – resplendent with Scissorhand-esque talons – the aforementioned ursid, and some woodland puppet creatures.
There is a lot going on here, and while undeniably enjoyable it is also too long (the interval is forced mid-speech by the fourth wall-testing revelation that one of the characters needs a wee; I concurred).
The cast fully embrace the exuberance of Garvey’s writing, which frequently finds itself in long riffs of rhyming couplets (some deliberately dubious for comic effect), or making daft puns that whizz by in a blink. There is nothing laboured here, with Tristin Pike, Alex Tiller, and Hannah Wood making a tight central trio of storytellers, displaying verbal and physical dexterity.
Their main audience – other than us – is Hollie Harrington as the girl in the tree, entranced by the tales and adding occasional sound effects to her wild-eyed wonder. She also shares directing duties with Garvey, and the pair make full use of the stage and fellow players with some inventive blocking.
Neither Joanna Swan and Paul Finlay as Death and The Bear respectively let their full-body costumes get in the way of their performances: we never see Swan’s face, and while Finlay does at least get to show his chops, that fur and head must have been unbearable in the current weather. Rebeka Igneczi rounds out the cast as gentle puppeteer to a small coterie of woodland creatures.
It’s a creative and unusual production that only really wanes because there is too much good writing to cut – but the best stories are ones that leave you wanting more.
- The Head That Bears continues at Norwich Puppet Theatre until Friday, 10 July 2026, tickets £10-12.