‘The transition from display screen to stage is not easy’ – The Garden Of Words overview

Based on Makato Shinkai’s anime movie (later a manga comedian and a novel), this can be a heady combination of social drama and poetic fantasy with somewhat little bit of puppetry and dance thrown in.

Co-adapted (with Susan Momoko Hingley, who additionally performs), directed and choreographed by Alexandra Rutter.

It follows the fortunes of a 15-year-old schoolboy Takao (Hiroki Berrecloth) who needs to be a shoemaker, and a trainer Yukari (Aki Nakagawa) whose fates intertwine through the wet season in Tokyo.

Both spend the mornings skyving for various causes – he designs sneakers, she drinks beer and eats chocolate – and so they forge an elusive, platonic relationship.

A form of consummation is achieved in a scene of delicate eroticism when he measures her foot for a pair of sneakers.

But the transition from display screen to stage is not as easy accurately; the quick scenes of cryptic exchanges and gnomic language, interspersed with cliched motion and a reasonably naff chook puppet don’t fairly gel despite largely wonderful performances.

While a number of the extra delicate cultural references are misplaced in translation, it stays intriguing although it could have benefited from a much less cluttered manufacturing.

The Garden of Words, Park Theatre till September 9, Tickets: 020 7870 6876