The Little Prince

Review by Ryan

⭐⭐⭐

A thoroughly underwhelming production that minimises its impact on London's largest stage.

While "The Little Prince" is an old French tale that some may be intimately familiar with, this production did little to expand that audience. As a non-French speaker who was not familiar with the story I have left the show still unfamiliar with the story. Therefore this review will guide readers to Google the story if interested as all I could write would paraphrase that.

Utilising the Coliseum's built in subtitle screen, the show was performed in French with English Surtitles, proving that all shows are capable of embedding this access provision. While this is great, the delivery of the lines were so sporadic that it became rather difficult to follow line to line, as whole sentences were split with minutes between them.

Undoubtedly, the cast are capable of a lot more than they've been given. On a massive stage there is regularly one or two performers at any given time, with any resemblance of set exclusively being a massive projection on the back screen and floor. In what is clearly a high budget production, to see an aerial performer simply lifted up and down on the spot with clouds projected behind them was significantly underwhelming.

There were many instances where the potential for something exciting to happen is teased and then swiftly removed leaving the audience in a constant state of anticipation and subsequent disappointment.

In moments when the stage was utilised more, the choreography of the dancers was interesting and unique. While in some instances repetitive, it was performed well by impressive dancers.

As a show aiming to welcome audience members of all ages into the auditorium, I felt the pace was too slow to maintain interest and the show would benefit from being cut down and removing the interval.

With a shorter run time and a significantly smaller stage, the show would be more interesting. But reliance on projections and constant impression of something more on the horizon, this show is simply disappointing.