
For Your Consideration
Dear Voter,
On behalf of our company and our entire producing team, we thank you for joining us at LIFE OF PI. We invite you to revisit the show’s dazzling stagecraft, emotional and uplifting storytelling, and remarkable performances.
Warmly,
The Producers of LIFE OF PI
Simon Friend, Daryl Roth, Hal Luftig, Mark Gordon
Best Play
Life of Pi
Lolita Chakrabarti
2022 Olivier Award Winner for Best Play
I first read Yann Martel’s novel in 2002. I found the story to be amazing and open-ended; there was an ambiguity to it that stayed with me. The story is an important examination of faith and survival. We learned from the run in the West End and were able to adapt and make changes to bring the best version of this story to Broadway. My hope is that audiences see their own lives in the characters in the play – whether it’s the pragmatic atheist, the strict father, the spiritual explorer, the fun auntie, or the empathetic diplomat. I hope people leave the theatre talking about what they believed happened on that boat. I hope they are inspired by Pi’s curiosities and sense of wonder.
Best Direction of a Play
Max Webster
When I first read Lolita Chakrabarti’s adaptation of LIFE OF PI, I found it to be a profound and moving story that asked important questions about survival, immigration, faith, our connection to the natural world, and our instincts as human beings. I also thought, ‘how on earth am I going to do this?!’
There is something about being asked to stage impossible things that is really exciting to me. There is opportunity for invention, creativity, playfulness, and making something that is surprising to the audience. Staging something impossible asks us in a deep way to engage our imagination. That, for me, is the core of what happens when we go to the theatre. We sit together in a room and think about how we might imagine something. And that is an act of real humanity.
Best Choreography
Finn Caldwell
Best Original Score
Andrew Mackay
Besides the spellbinding puppetry, the production features stunning projection designs, special effects, lighting, sound design and musical underscoring that combine to create a truly stunning experience.
Best Scenic Design of a Play
Tim Hatley & Andrzej Goulding
2022 Olivier Award Winner for Best Set Design
Best Costume Design of a Play
Tim Hatley, Nick Barnes, & Finn Caldwell
It is very rare for a puppet designer that a project comes along combining puppets and actors in such a seamless and exciting way as LIFE OF PI.
We wanted to allow and encourage the audience to enjoy treading the fine line between objective verity and theatrical storytelling. Our aim was to make puppets that felt vital, palpable, and able to convey the rigors of life and death and the serious themes of the play, whilst avoiding becoming overly naturalistic.
The emotional engagement is phenomenal in its weight and how well the tale resonates across the ocean and the stage, but none of that would work as well as it does if not for the phenomenal talent of the whole production/design team, namely; the breathtaking scenic and costume design by Tim Hatley (West End/Broadway’s Travesties), the detailed and dynamic puppet designs by Finn Caldwell and Nick Barnes.
Best Lighting Design of a Play
Tim Lutkin
2022 Olivier Award Winner for Best Lighting Design
Lighting Pi is a complex and intricate endeavor. I harnessed new technologies to create seamless transitioning between the different worlds Pi conjures up in his storytelling.
The challenge is to fully embrace the video world, enhancing it constantly with deep saturated color washes and texture whilst drawing the audience’s eye to the performers and puppets. For this, we pioneered a specific use of a complex lighting track system. With its use, we were able to follow multiple performers and puppets in a full spectrum of colors and angles to make them sing out again the show’s wonderful floor designs and backdrops.
Lutkin’s lighting, which turns a bustling market into a salty cargo ship with the flick of a switch, exemplifies the height of simple, jaw-dropping stagecraft.
Best Sound Design of a Play
Carolyn Downing
Composer Andrew T. Mackay has given the show the full orchestral treatment, while sound designer Carolyn Downing comes up with atmospheric, at times terrifying effects.
Best Leading Actor in a Play
Hiran Abeysekera
2022 Olivier Award Winner for Best Actor
Best Featured Actor in a Play
Rajesh Bose, Sathya Sridharan, Daisuke Tsuji, Avery Glymph, and Brian Abraham
Rajesh Bose
Father
Sathya Sridharan
Mamaji / Pandit-Ji
Daisuke Tsuji
Mr. Okamoto / Captain
Avery Glymph
Father Martin / Russian Sailor / Admiral Jackson, Fight Captain
Brian Abraham
Cook / Voice of Richard Parker
Fred Davis
Richard Parker / Puppeteer / Puppet Captain
Andrew Wilson
Richard Parker / Puppeteer, Lift Captain
Rowan Ian Seamus Magee
Richard Parker / Puppeteer
Jonathan David Martin
Richard Parker / Puppeteer
Best Featured Actress in a Play
Sonya Venugopal, Mahira Kakkar, Kirstin Louie, and Salma Qarnain
Sonya Venugopal
Rani
Mahira Kakkar
Nurse / Amma / Orange Juice
Kirstin Louie
Lulu Chen
Salma Qarnain
Mrs. Biology-Kumar / Zaida Khan
Scarlet Wilderink
Richard Parker / Puppeteer
Celia Mei Rubin
Richard Parker / Puppeteer