Theatre performance blends acting and puppetry to create a show you will never forget

Life of Pi is an extraordinarily captivating piece of theatre which will live with you long after the final curtain.

The story is based around the sinking of a cargo ship and a 16-year-old boy’s battle for survival on a lifeboat accompanied only by a hyena, an orangutan, a zebra and a Bengal tiger.

Darwin’s theory of the Survival of the Fittest plays out in front of you until only Pi and the erroneously named tiger, Richard Parker, remain.

The set is a stark hospital ward but each time a character enters the centre stage door it is like opening an advent calendar with a colourful treat hidden behind it.

The back stage crew along with the video and lighting experts really make this show sing.

But the special lighting/video effects which appear to show the stage flooded as Pi is stranded in the middle of the ocean are truly breathtaking.

Divesh Subaskaran brings Pi to life. It is almost unbelievable that this is his first professional role.

Subaskaran’s portrayal is warm and funny but also perfectly captures the post traumatic stress at Pi’s terrifying fight for survival and the realisation his entire family have been drowned in the disaster.

The show is let down a tad by the more flat performances of some of the supporting cast but the puppetry skills more than make up for it.

It is the greatest melding of puppets and humans since War Horse.

You very quickly suspended reality. Richard Parker instantly becomes a real Bengal tiger with the human operators so at one with him you completely forget he isn’t actually feline.

And the other aninals portrayed by the puppeteers are equally believable.

The brutal deaths of some of them were not for the squeamish and you felt a real sense of loss and anguish as they met their ends.

To achieve that with puppets is a tribute to the incredible skills of the performers.

It is funny, moving and thought provoking and the Life of You will be poorer without a ticket.

• Runs until Saturday in Glasgow before opening in Edinburgh next week.