Jim Henson Creature Shop, Royal Shakespeare Company to produce ‘My Neighbor Totoro’ play
MANILA, Philippines – Studio Ghibli’s My Neighbor Totoro is set to get its own play led by the Jim Henson Creature Shop and the Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC).
The play will open at London’s Barbican Centre in October 2022.
Jim Henson’s Creature Shop, the studio behind Sesame Street and The Muppet Show, has been tapped to make life-size puppets for the 1988 film’s play adaptation. According to a Deadline report, the esteemed visual effects company will be basing its designs on UK puppeteer Basil Twist’s past creations.
The company stressed the importance of maintaining the film characters’ original visual compositions and personalities. “Whether an audience member is a longtime fan of this iconic story, or new to Miyazaki’s fantastical world, they will be simply amazed when they see these magical creatures live on stage in a whole new way in My Neighbor Totoro,” said its creative supervisor Peter Brooke.
Significant Object’s Mervyn Millar has also been assigned to design additional puppets for the production.
Meanwhile, the play’s storyline will be written by English playwright Tom Morton-Smith, who is known for his 2015 play Oppenheimer, and will be directed by Phelim McDermott.
Audiences can expect to hear composer Joe Hisashi’s original score for the film adapted by Will Stuart and performed live with sound design by Tony Gayle, a Variety report said.
The play adaptation was pitched by Hisashi to the film’s animator Hayao Miyazaki.
“[My Neighbor] Totoro is a Japanese work famous throughout the world, and so this stage adaptation could have the potential to reach global audiences…. I told Mr. Miyazaki, ‘I want to see such a show,’ and he said, ‘Yes, only if you are going to do it,’” Hisashi told Variety.
My Neighbor Totoro is a 1988 animated film directed by Hayao Miyazaki. It follows sisters Satsuke and Mei, who have just moved to the countryside with their father while their mother recovers in the hospital. The sisters explore the forest surrounding their new home and eventually come to befriend Totoro and the other kind forest spirits around them. – with reports from Juno Reyes/Rappler.com
Juno Reyes is a Rappler intern.