Puk by Valeri Petrov

Director: Dimitar Stefanov

Set Designer: Yasmin Mandelli

Composer: Milen Apostolov

Cast: Andrey Ivanov, Velizar Evtimov, Dimitar Nikolov, Evdokia Encheva, Elin Stoyanova, Lambreti Kolev, Lyubov Zheleva, Stayko Staykov

Description

Ah, how pure, transparent, and clear that child’s “the sea is thin” sounds!

The telephone booth by the beach turns into a magical gateway to an underwater world, where a little girl named Lily sets off in search of a magic pearl — the one that makes the heart good. Along the way, she meets the terrifying Hrili, the gluttonous jellyfish, the sly mussel, the sole, the octopus, the corals, and many other strange inhabitants of the deep.

Every encounter is a trial, every “horror” a window into courage, compassion, and the ability to tell true goodness from beautiful deception. And the greatest magic turns out not to be the pearl, but the friendship between a child, a “terrible” fish, and a wrinkled old man who for a moment remembers what it means to believe again.

Based on Valeri Petrov’s poetic text Puk, the performance tells, with great humor, music, and tenderness, how one grows up — without losing the child within. The story of Lily, Hrili, and the Wrinkled Man is at once a funny seaside fairy tale for children and a wise mirror for adults who still secretly remember their summer vacations, their first fears, their first friendships, and that fragile “puk” in the heart after which you are never quite the same.