Cover Roald Dahl’s ‘The BFG’ arrives in Singapore as the production’s first performance outside the UK
Roald Dahl’s ‘The BFG’ arrives in Singapore as the production’s first performance outside the UK
1 / 1
A major international co-production between the Royal Shakespeare Company, Chichester Festival Theatre, Roald Dahl Story Company, Singapore Repertory Theatre and Esplanade – Theatres on the Bay, Roald Dahl’s ‘The BFG’ turns scale, spectacle and smallness into a story of courage
In Roald Dahl’s The BFG, size arrives before language. A child is lifted from an orphanage into Giant Country, where ears enlarge, dreams glow and the world shifts around her. On stage, in a new adaptation by Tom Wells, Dahl’s story asks for a particular kind of belief. The audience must accept that bodies can multiply, that a girl can exist as human, puppet and miniature, that a door or blanket might change dimensions before the eye has fully caught up. Yet the wonder lies not only in how large this staging can make the world appear, but in how precisely it understands the minutiae.
Directed by Daniel Evans for a five-way co-production between the Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC), Chichester Festival Theatre, Roald Dahl Story Company, Singapore Repertory Theatre (SRT) and Esplanade – Theatres on the Bay, The BFG arrives at the Esplanade Theatre as the production’s first performance outside the UK and its only international stop for now. After its world premiere at the Royal Shakespeare Theatre in Stratford-upon-Avon last November, followed by Chichester this March, and Singapore for a three-week run from April 22 to May 9, its itinerary gives the city a meaningful place in the life of the work. More compellingly, the production turns scale into both theatrical craft and narrative force.
Evans, who is also co-artistic director of the RSC, makes that intention explicit. “In finding ways to represent giants, dreams and nightmares onstage—no mean feat!—we’ve been inventive in our staging, particularly when exploring the relationship between scale and power.” That thought gives the production its moral proportion. While it trades in size, puppetry, digital spectacle and illusion, its deeper question is what power looks like when it does not announce itself through force.
Read also: Esplanade CEO Yvonne Tham on making the arts accessible and inclusive
Above ‘The BFG’ tells the story of Sophie, a young orphan whisked away to Giant Country
‘The BFG’ tells the story of Sophie, a young orphan whisked away to Giant Country
1 / 1
The endurance of The BFG lies in the clarity of its emotional proposition. “The story is so profound and is told with great simplicity,” Evans says. “At a very basic level, it’s about an orphan girl who is kidnapped by a giant. They end up forming a friendship and, in alliance with the Queen, triumph over the evil giants and save the children of the world.” Its appeal, he suggests, sits somewhere between past and present: “There is something both ancient and contemporary in that premise. We all want to feel like we belong to a tribe or a group who inspires us, who cares for us, who helps us bring about good in the world.”
Sophie, played in alternation by Martha Bailey Vine, Elsie Laslett and Ellemie Shivers, is the emotional centre. She may enter the story as a child in a nightgown, taken from everything familiar, but she quickly becomes the production’s source of motion. Snatched into a world designed to dwarf her, Sophie is never simply overwhelmed by it. Her fear sharpens into action. Her loneliness becomes a search for belonging. Her belief in the BFG—short for Big Friendly Giant—gives him the courage to act, and her plan reaches all the way to the Queen’s bedroom. In a production preoccupied with bodies, surfaces and illusion, Sophie’s power remains stubbornly interior: imagination, initiative, courage.
Above Sophie befriends the dream-catching, snozzcumber-munching Big Friendly Giant
Sophie befriends the dream-catching, snozzcumber-munching Big Friendly Giant
1 / 1
Opposite her, the BFG is both spectacle and soul. John Leader plays the gentle giant who catches dreams rather than devouring children, assisted by the visible labour and discipline of puppetry. His enlarged ears turn listening into a physical feature; his snozzcumber-munching oddness offsets the brute comedy of the other giants. The Bloodbottler embodies power as appetite. The Queen introduces ceremony, state and breakfast-table composure into a child’s audacious plan. Together, these figures create a world where authority is continually resized.
The production repeatedly jumps between scales: actors, puppets and mini-puppets appear as versions of the same characters; doors, blankets and even the orphanage shift in proportion. Almost everything seems to have been made for this particular theatrical universe, from dream jars to giant vegetables, because Dahl’s world resists the ordinary logic of stage furniture. The dream jars hold visions that appear distinct from one another, each with its own strange personality. The snozzcumbers draw on the knobbly forms of okra and bitter gourd, their grotesque comedy pushed into something tactile and almost edible, in the least appetising way. These details reveal the intelligence beneath the visual pleasure. The surfaces may be whimsical, but the mechanics are exacting.
Above The Queen introduces ceremony, state and breakfast-table composure into a child’s audacious plan
The Queen introduces ceremony, state and breakfast-table composure into a child’s audacious plan
1 / 1
Evans describes the long development process as one of experiment and elimination. “It has been years in the development and we were lucky to be able to hold many workshops to test our ideas,” he says. “For example, one workshop explored creating the giant only using circus skills, but for a few reasons we decided to explore puppetry instead. Once we began down that road, it felt right for us.” That choice matters. Puppetry allows the giant body to be constructed in front of the audience: head, arms, scale and movement held together by human coordination. Theatre invites us to feel the labour of wonder rather than simply consume its effect.
The same sense of scale extends beyond the stage. For Esplanade, co-producing The BFG means more than welcoming a major international work into its theatre. As Rachelle Tan, assistant CEO for Enterprise, frames it, the collaboration places Esplanade alongside internationally renowned companies “for the creation of a new, large-scale literary adaptation that promises to capture the imagination of audiences globally”. It also shifts the institution’s role. “This also allows Esplanade to move beyond being solely a presenter and venue to becoming a creative partner in works with global reach,” she notes.
Above The Bloodbottler embodies power as appetite
The Bloodbottler embodies power as appetite
1 / 1
That distinction is important. Singapore’s place in this production is not confined to the calendar. Through SRT and Esplanade, the city becomes part of the making and future circulation of the work. For audiences, the benefit is immediate: a chance to encounter a major new adaptation early in its life. For practitioners, the value may be longer lasting. Tan points to the production’s use of “advanced stage technologies, including real-time performer tracking systems and integrated lighting, sound and projection design”. Being part of the creation process, she adds, allows Esplanade’s technical production teams “to gain invaluable hands-on experience that is rarely available outside large-scale international touring productions”.
For SRT, the distinction between presenting and co-producing is equally crucial. As artistic director Gaurav Kripalani puts it, “When you present [a production], you just bring them in as part of a tour. For The BFG, we’re actually involved from the get-go. And we have a stake in its future life.” It is a simple but meaningful shift. Singapore is not merely receiving The BFG after its UK run; it has helped bring the production into being. For a city accustomed to hosting major international works, that marks a different kind of cultural participation—one rooted in partnership, shared risk and the transfer of knowledge.
In case you missed it: Singapore Repertory Theatre’s Gaurav Kripalani on turning Singapore into a cultural capital of the world
Above Together, these figures create a world where authority is continually resized
Together, these figures create a world where authority is continually resized
1 / 1
Kripalani is clear about why the city-state can carry that responsibility. “Singapore is a cosmopolitan city with a state-of-the-art facility and skilled manpower that makes this the perfect place to bring international work here,” he says. “And our goal then is to create international work here that we will also take up.” In that sense, The BFG points to a larger ambition: for Singapore to participate in the ecosystem of large-scale international theatre not only as a host, but as a collaborator with a stake in how work is made, supported and carried forward.
Tan sees that potential extending to practitioners too. “More broadly, co-producing projects like The BFG can also open pathways for Singapore practitioners,” she notes. “When productions tour internationally, there may be opportunities for artists and technical crew from Singapore to be part of the wider ecosystem of touring theatre.”
Above ‘Roald Dahl’s ‘The BFG’ is a five-way co-production between the Royal Shakespeare Company, Chichester Festival Theatre, Roald Dahl Story Company, Singapore Repertory Theatre and Esplanade – Theatres on the Bay
‘Roald Dahl’s ‘The BFG’ is a five-way co-production between the Royal Shakespeare Company, Chichester Festival Theatre, Roald Dahl Story Company, Singapore Repertory Theatre and Esplanade – Theatres on the Bay
1 / 1
The production’s deepest pleasure may rest in this inversion: the largest things on stage keep pointing us back to the smallest voice. A brooch can defeat a brute. A dream can trouble a palace. A child can wake a queen. The staging gives Dahl’s fable a theatrical body, but its emotional force lies in the quiet proposition beneath the spectacle. Power, in the end, belongs to the one who dares to imagine differently.
Credits
Images: AlvieAlive
As Senior Editor of Tatler Singapore, Hashirin champions and refines the storytelling across platforms—curating and crafting compelling profiles, cover stories and features that spotlight visionaries shaping culture, business and impact. Driven by curiosity, she draws inspiration from the artists, changemakers and trailblazers she encounters through her work. Beyond the pages of Tatler, she is an avid supporter of local theatre and delights in seeking out art in every city she visits.
