Toby Olié started making puppets when he was six years old. Now aged 37, he’s a professional puppeteer, director and designer. He’s also co-founder of theatre company Gyre & Gimble, which specialises in puppetry.

And it all started with a library book.

“In my school’s library, there was a book about how to make puppets,” he recalls. “I remember it had a dinosaur made out of an egg box on the cover. I took the book home and it ignited a passion in me. 

“As a child, I was constantly making things out of toilet rolls and cereal packets. Throughout all my school years, I used puppetry as a meeting point for art and drama. I was very fortunate to have a patient and supportive family who would sit through my puppet theatres.”

Toby’s family are still sitting through his puppet theatres today - only on a much grander scale. Going on to train in puppetry at the Royal Central School of Speech & Drama, he then showcased his talent in the Olivier Award-winning stage production of War Horse. 

War Horse was something of a watershed moment for puppetry in theatre. Director Tom Morris was inspired to adapt the Michael Morpurgo novel for the stage after discovering the work of South Africa’s Handspring Puppet Company. The result is a show which has been seen by more than eight million people in 11 countries, along the way winning numerous awards.

“We were all very aware that War Horse was unusual in having a puppet as the protagonist for an entire show, let alone the fact that the character doesn’t talk,” Toby explains. “The audience has to believe that the puppet is real, and I think that erupted into puppets and actors sharing the stage together and telling the story as equals.”

Now Toby is taking on an even bigger challenge, as puppetry designer & director for a show with a cast full of puppets - a stage adaptation of George Orwell’s classic novel, Animal Farm. 

Having previously worked with the show’s production company, Fiery Angel, on Goodnight Mr Tom and Running Wild, Toby was brought on board by Animal Farm’s director, Robert Icke, who has also adapted the novel for the stage.

“Rob has been amazingly trusting and enthusiastic. He told me he wanted to write the script in response to what the puppets do well - and as a puppeteer, that’s just a dream to hear!

“Often in rehearsals I’ll have to explain that the animal puppets don’t always need to say something, because they can show it with their body language. With Animal Farm, it’s been really exciting to see Rob combine his world and my world and start to see the strengths of the puppets.” 

Orwell’s satirical novel tells the story of a group of animals who take over the farm they live on. A political allegory about the Russian Revolution, the story remains relevant almost 80 years after it was published. 

Toby is keen for the stage adaptation to be similarly relevant to the modern world: “It’s an emotional workout, watching this show. The animals go through so much, and they go through things that humans are going through right now in terms of leaders having one rule for themselves and another for everyone else. 

“My parents have seen it, and they said it felt as if they’d been through an emotional wringer. That’s a good thing, though, because I want people to connect with the puppets. If this show packs an emotional punch, then we’re doing it right.”

Encouraging the audience to invest in characters which, when off stage, are inanimate objects, is no mean feat. But Toby’s years of experience mean that he’s well-versed in the art of grabbing people’s attention with his puppets.

“The biggest challenge as a director is making it clear where we want the audience’s focus to be. In Animal Farm, some scenes have 10 puppets on stage at once, all talking over each other. So if they’re all moving at the same time, the audience’s focus is going to be stretched too thin.

“A big part of my job is making sure the other animals in the scene are casting the spotlight on whichever one is talking at the time. And with two or three people operating each animal, adjusting one small moment is the equivalent of working with six or eight actors, so there’s a lot of coordination required.”

Despite the challenges in adapting a show with a cast full of puppeteers, Toby promises that audiences can look forward to a largely faithful retelling of Orwell’s novel - even down to the size of the animals.

“Almost all the puppets in Animal Farm are to scale. The pigeons and chickens are a little bit bigger - just so people sitting in the back row can see them - and we’ve been playful with the colouring of the animals, to make sure the audience can tell them all apart.

“Other changes we made were to make one of the pigs, Squealer, female, because it’s a very male-dominated story. And Clover - who’s a cart horse in the book - is a dairy cow in our version, so we have a bit more variation in the animals. But the sequence of events is very much the same as in the novel.”

Toby has gone from looking after one principal puppet in War Horse to a whole cast of them in Animal Farm, but perhaps his biggest-ever undertaking comes this summer: designing and directing 101 Dalmatians at Regent Park’s Open Air Theatre. 

With puppetry becoming increasingly commonplace in mainstream theatre, the talent it requires has not gone unrecognised. Just last month the seven puppeteers who play and operate the tiger puppet in the stage adaptation of Life Of Pi were nominated for an Olivier Award for Best Supporting Actor. Toby is pleased to see members of his profession being recognised for their skills and accomplishments.

“Life Of Pi’s nomination is such an important acknowledgement of the art form, and I’m excited to see how puppetry can keep exceeding people’s expectations in the future.

“There are so many shows I’d like to do with puppets, and it’s wonderful to see people becoming more accustomed to puppetry in the theatre.” 

Animal Farm shows at Wolverhampton Grand Theatre, from Tuesday 17 to Sat 21 May