DIMANCHE
Peacock Theatre
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“the overall effect is to seduce us with a series of visuals that pack surprising punch, for all their whimsy”
The Belgian companies Focus and ChaliwatΓ© have brought a co-production to the Peacock Theatre as part of 2025 Mime London. Their show Dimanche is a charming and whimsical piece of visual theatre, featuring puppets, humans, and sets that are both miniaturized and full size. The locations are as varied as an arctic landscape, a desert island complete with tsunami, and the house of an ordinary couple (with grandma) trying to adapt to climate change. This is a show for all ages. Children in particular will appreciate the cute animals which range from polar bears, sharks and flamingoes.
Dimanche arrives in London under the umbrella of Mime London, which specializes in finding companies whose work is hard to categorize. Curators Helen Lannaghan and Joseph Seelig have teamed up to take the place of the London International Mime Festival, which closed in 2023. Mime London is smaller scale than the LIMF, but still adept at bringing intriguing work to brighten a dark and post holiday January. With well equipped theatres such as the Barbican and Peacock hosting the festival, itβs a chance for West End audiences to see work that is usually performed abroad.
The work of Compagnie Focus and ChaliwatΓ© in particular resists easy definition. Dimanche features three performers who take on a variety of roles in a series of wide ranging locations. They work as actors, as puppeteers, and even turn into the locations themselves from time to time. The show opens in the arctic. We watch an intrepid film crew document the effects of climate change. Our parka clad team attempt everything from driving in a blizzard to crossing unstable ice. Sometimes the scenes are miniaturized, in which case the body of one performer becomes the snowy landscape. Tiny cars drive over the curves and precipitous bends, headlights blazing through the darkness. When the ice gives way, and the audience finds itself plunged underwater, a video projected onto a screen takes over the action. For most companies, this would be sufficient challenge. But this team is just getting warmed up. From arctic exteriors the audience is transported to a domestic interior where rising temperatures outside make even the most mundane of household tasks fraught with risk. From malfunctioning electrics to melting furniture, we see Grandma and her family attempt everyday activities as though the heat were completely normal. Only when the wind and the rain literally carry the family away do we realize that the jokeβs on us. This is what climate change looks like.
Compagnie Focus and ChaliwatΓ© manage to pack in an impressive number of climate change vignettes in just over an hour. They present their theme with humour and a lightness of touch that belies the seriousness of the subject. If thereβs one criticism, it is that thereβs no overarching narrative, which makes it challenging to tune immediately into each scene change. At other times, the scenery (and the show) seems a bit lost on the large stage of the Peacock Theatre. But the overall effect is to seduce us with a series of visuals that pack surprising punch, for all their whimsy. The ice is melting, polar bears are being stranded on icebergs, and further south, people are struggling with hotter weather, more violent storms, and seas that threaten everything on land. Dimanche makes its point while beguiling us with cute baby polar bears stranded on icebergs, and flapping flamingos caught in destructive winds.
Dimanche is a delightful show that teaches with its entertainment. Kudos to Mime London for making Compagnie Focus and ChaliwatΓ© part of the 2025 line up. See this show if you can. It wonβt be in London long!
DIMANCHE
Peacock Theatre
Reviewed on 30th January 2025
by Dominica Plummer
Photography by Mihaela Bodlovic
Previously reviewed at Sadler’s Wells venues:
SONGS OF THE WAYFARER | β β β β | December 2024
NOBODADDY (TRΓD AN BPOLL GAN BUN) | β β β β | November 2024
THE SNOWMAN | β β β β | November 2024
EXIT ABOVE | β β β β | November 2024
ΞΞΞ‘ΞΞΞ (FAUVE) | β β β | October 2024
STORIES – THE TAP DANCE SENSATION | β β β β β | October 2024
FRONTIERS: CHOREOGRAPHERS OF CANADA | β β β β | October 2024
TUTU | β β β | October 2024
CARMEN | β β β β | July 2024
THE OPERA LOCOS | β β β β | May 2024
ASSEMBLY HALL | β β β β β | March 2024
AUTOBIOGRAPHY (v95 and v96) | β β β | March 2024
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