The other day I had a conversation about the impending oil crisis with a friend of mine.

"There's nothing that one person can do. It would be better to leave Bermuda and find somewhere that will be comfy when the oil runs out," he argued.

(As if there could be anywhere comfy without oil).

Try as I might, I couldn't convince him to believe that one person had the power to change any thing.

The Bermuda Festival offering 'The Man Who Planted Trees' on at the Daylesford Theatre until February 17, seemed a continuation of this very conversation. Can one man create a forest where once there was a barren landscape?

The playwright, Jean Giono's answer would have to be a resounding 'Yes!'.

Least one envision a serious lecture or hand slap about environmental responsibility, 'The Man Who Planted Trees', performed by the Puppet State Theatre Company, isn't like that. The message or moral is a gentle backdrop to a funny and whimsical puppet show set in France.

The main character Jean (Richard Medrington), repeatedly visits a shepherd, Elzeard Bouffier and his dog over a period of time that roughly spans the first and second world war.

During that time Jean watches as Elzeard quietly goes about planting a forest.

It is the simplicity of the puppet show that makes it so very clever. A flock of sheep dangle from a long pole and scamper across the French hills. A similar pole helps a flock of birds to fly over the heads of the audience. Ailie Cohen who was responsible for direction, soundscape, the set, puppets and props, has done an amazing job. Bruce Hallet, Alison Croft, Bryony Knox, June Medrington, and David & Frances Cohen also helped with puppets and props.

'The Man Who Planted Trees' is a sensory experience. Various (pleasant) smells are wafted over the audience at crucial moments and real rain falls. There is also catchy French music to liven things up.

The puppetry is deceptively simple. You can often see the puppet master known as 'Jean's 'Colleague'' (Rick Conte), and his mouth moves unashamedly when the dog talks. And yet, after about half a second, you forget the mechanics, and you forget the colleague.

The dog steals the show. While the shepherd communicates only in gestures, Dog has a lot to say. "They say I'm effervescent and jaunty," he says cockily at one point. And that is exactly how Dog could be described. Dog had both children and adults in fits of giggles.

'The Man Who Planted Trees' was written in 1953 by French author Jean Giono.

Mr. Giono, who died in 1970, was well known for his fiction set in the Provence region of France. 'The Man Who Planted Trees' came about when Mr. Giono was asked by the Reader's Digest to write something for a feature entitled 'The Most Extraordinary Person I Have Ever Known'. He submitted 'The Man Who Planted Trees'. Readers Digest turned it down when they learned it was fiction. Mr. Giono reportedly said, "If you didn't want fiction you shouldn't have come to a novelist".

It is a little disappointing that the story is fictional. It loses just a twinge of its inspirational appeal when you find out that there never was a man named Elzeard who created a forest.

Nevertheless, the same friend who refused to believe one man could make a difference left the theatre saying, "I have the urge to plant a tree".

So arguably, there really was a man who at least planted little seeds, and that was Mr. Giono himself.