"Paddington stands within touching distance. His fur flutters as he turns, his neat button nose sniffs the air, and his eyes soften with a smile. For years, design details of the bear for Paddington the Musical, directed by Luke Sheppard, have been kept top secret. Now here he is, in his blue duffel coat and red hat. A quiet theatrical marvel."
"What we're doing, says producer Sonia Friedman, has never been done before. Standing around 1.2 metres (just under 4ft) tall, the bear is beautifully round, all belly and sloping shoulders. He is not an exact replica of the Paddingtons we've seen in illustrations or movies, but something new. His shaggy, caramel fur has a gentle wave, and his white snout is dotted with a brown nose, ideal for sniffing out trouble."
"When fellow producer Eliza Lumley first had the idea of doing a musical of Michael Bond's Paddington in 2016, the immediate question was how to do the bear. We wanted to see if it was possible to have Paddington on stage, says Friedman, who joined the team two years in. Just Paddington. They tested out every idea, finding puppetry to be gorgeous, Lumley says, but slightly whimsical."
Paddington stands in a blue duffel coat and red hat with shaggy caramel fur, a white snout and a brown button nose. The bear measures about 1.2 metres tall and is round with sloping shoulders. A label threaded on string asks for someone to look after him. Producers aimed for a solitary onstage bear and tested puppetry but found visible puppeteers conflicted with that vision. Creature designer Tahra Zafar was enlisted after a recommendation from Neal Scanlan. The stage adaptation is written by Jessica Swale with music by Tom Fletcher and directed by Luke Sheppard.
Read at www.theguardian.com
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