There is something about it that is quite joyous.
It has a presence and an energy that when you see it,
you can't help sort of go, "Ahh, aren't you sweet?"
Vernon Guest, who is the producer of the event, and Lieven
put this proposal to me that they had this very large duck.
It's about five storeys.
So you have to open the bridge and the monorail
to get this thing into Darling Harbour.
- Well, we did a rehearsal.
We started at 5:30, I guess.
They found out today that you don't want to pull it, you want to push it.
And we have, like, two metres spare on the bridge,
one metre either side.
- (Patrick) Every time Florentijn presents this work,
a new duck is created in response to the site.
- (Florentijn) I can assure you, there are many different types of rubber duck.
With a big face, with a small beak, big beak.
I try to find the perfect one.
It brings back memories, you know, to your childhood.
And everybody had a childhood.
The rubber duck connects everyone.
- (Patrick) We sort of took that idea of enchantment and the child
and all the pleasure of having a bath
and that became the inspiration for putting together
what is, in the end, really a 90-minute party.
A boy turns up in a bath tub.
He's there to have a bath and he's looking for a duck to have a bath with.
There is a 40-voice choir,
14 of some of the best acrobats in the country,
a marching brass band,
40 saxophone players
who play a quackophony. (LAUGHS)
- (Florentijn) It seems a very simple project,
like it's an inflatable, you blow it up and that's it.
But it's a circle pontoon, custom-made.
If there's too much wind, you have to abort the project.
So I cross my fingers in hope that Saturday we have, like, a nice breeze.
The project has been now on for almost ten years
and it has been a success all over the world.
It's about one family and you have to take care of each other in the world.
And our global waterways, it's our bath tub and we have to take care of it.
It will stay in place till the end of the festival
and I hope everybody will come and see it.
- I don't know what's going to happen to the duck.
Perhaps it's set adrift and goes looking for another home somewhere else.
It's a question you're gonna have to ask the duck, I'm sorry.