Some large pink snake-skin shoes I made recently for Jigsaw Theatre Company’s production Little Brother Big Sister, design by Imogen Keen. I had fun with the curly thing at the back.
theatre
Anne Frank: Within and Without
In January the Center for Puppetry Arts in Atlanta put on a puppet production called Anne Frank: Within and Without that looks as if it would have been amazing. An article in the New York Times, describes how the writer and director, Bobby Box
“tackles his subject by having two actresses manipulate the doll-like puppets, which look like pose-able mannequins. The actresses, pin-curled and identically costumed in prim knee-length gray wool skirts, white blouses, gray cardigans and Mary Janes, are both introduced to the audience as Anne. Sometimes they seem to be personifications of Anne’s memory or different aspects of her personality. Sometimes they seem like ghostly grown-up versions of an Anne Frank who has been allowed, in death, to age and return to tell her story.
The two performers move the puppets in and around a giant cutaway dollhouse, an exact replica of the annex rooms where Anne and her family hid. Watching grown women play with dolls this way turns out to be surprisingly macabre.
There are examples of the tender-turned-terrible throughout the show, including a cradle that later becomes the cattle car carrying the residents of the annex to their deaths.”
There is also a great slide show of some of the scenes, and puppets in action, linked in the sidebar of the NYT article.
In other accounts the production is described as ‘a celebration of life love and faith’ and ‘a meditation on hope and all that is good in human kind’.
Here are some other links:
JTOnline: Puppets tell Tragic Girl’s Story
SouthernVoice Online: Adult puppet show with two gay principals
aligns Holocaust experience with religious and political extremism that
still exists today.
Bobby Box’s photos in Amsterdam for set design
Productions in the works: notes on the production as it progresses
Access Atlanta: Ann Frank’s hope inspires puppet show (3 pics)
Updated links 2015
Spare Parts Puppet Theatre: The Velveteen Rabbit
Spare Parts Puppet Theatre in Perth, WA, is presenting ‘The Velveteen Rabbit’ in June and July.
‘An enchanting story where anything is possible if you invest it with enough belief and love. Based on the classic children’s story by Marjory Williams, (and adapted by Greg Lissaman) the velveteen rabbit is the much cherished toy of a young boy. To his family it was merely a plush toy, in amongst many, but the boy (and the rabbit) knew he was real. Was it just imagination or can the bond of love make something real?’
Dates and times are available here.
I caught an interview about the production with Philip Mitchell, the Artistic Director of Spare Parts, on the ABC program Life Matters last week. You can still listen to it by following the audio link for June 7th here. (links no longer available)
Puppetry Daemons in ‘His Dark Materials’
By all accounts the two-part 6 hour stage adaptation of Philip Pullman’s trilogy His Dark Materials is absolutely stunning. I think it has had two seasons at the National Theatre in London: one in 2003, and a second that finished earlier this month.
The daemons, physical manifestations of the human soul in the shape of animals that reflect a person’s character, are puppets. They were designed by Michael Curry, who is perhaps best known for the puppets in The Lion King. Stagework has an extensive website on the adaptation, and its possible to see a few of the initial designs there, and glimpses of the puppetry in some of the video clips:
Operating the golden monkey
Lyra meets Mrs Coulter
Cittagazee performance
Captured by bears
Lyra and Iorek (scene in rehearsal)
In both these and the puppets in ‘The Lion King’, I think the magic lies in how the overall shape and actions of the creatures are suggested. Often the puppeteers are built into the shape in unexpected ways, and they use their whole bodies to make the animal move. In ‘The Lion King’, for instance, the puppeteers playing the hyenas held the hyena heads low down and at arms length, while their own heads provided the high shoulder line that is so distinctive in a hyena’s overall shape. Likewise, the polar bears in ‘His Dark Materials’, are defined by a puppeteer holding a head mask in one hand and a great clawed paw in the other, with just the suggestion of great shoulders in what looks like a flexible curved line between the two, and a powerful lumbering gait.
Bridge to the stars, which looks as if its the natural online home for ‘His Dark Materials’ fans, has a section on the stage adaptation, including a guide to the Stagework site, images and reviews.
Don’t miss Jigsaw’s ‘The Lost Thing’ at the Sydney Festival…
If you are in Sydney, don’t miss Jigsaw Theatre Company’s production of ‘The Lost Thing’ this week. Its part of the Sydney Festival, and is playing at the Parramatta Riverside Theatre, from Jan 18 – 22. Its great news that the play will also be being presented by the Canberra Theatre Centre in March.
In December at the the annual Canberra Critics Circle Awards, Jigsaw’s artistic director, Greg Lissaman, won the The Canberra Times Artist of the Year award, and the company also picked up a theatre award for ‘the excellence, impact and theatrical creativity of Arborio‘. ‘Arborio’ is going up to the Sydney Opera House later in 2005. All cool news!
More ‘Lost Thing’ puppet pictures
Here are some more photos of the puppet build for Jigsaw Theatre Company’s production of ‘The lost thing’. The making crew were Imogen Keen and Hilary Talbot, with help from Catherine Prosser and Marie-Martine Ferrari, and designs by Richard Jeziorny based on Shaun Tan’s book ‘The Lost Thing’.
The cat :: carved out of foam, and made to sit on a beanie that one of the puppeteers wears
The janitor :: about 70cm tall
The small version of the lost thing :: about 70cm tall
The booth lady
The parents :: about 80cm tall on their sofa
The seagulls
The tram :: about 40cm long. It has interchangeable cut-outs of the people inside
The tram :: top detail
The boys :: Pete and Shaun are 35cm tall, and the little version Shaun is 25cm
Shaping the utopia lost things out of polystyrene, and painting them in the sunshine :: Imogen Keen, Catherine Prosser & Hilary Talbot
The utopia lost things carved but not finished :: they range in size from about 40cm across (the rower) to 150cm tall (the eye)
The utopia lost things
The Lost Thing plays at the National Gallery of Australia this coming week, 6-9th Oct.
Making the puppets for ‘The Lost Thing’
As promised below, here are some pictures of the build of Jigsaw Theatre Company’s production of The Lost Thing. Imogen Keen and I have been making the puppets for the production.
The aluminium structure of the Lost Thing itself was made by Brian Sudding, who also constructed the set. We then covered and detailed it, adding tentacles, claws, and eye mechanisms. The designer, Richard Jeziorny, added further painted detail. The whole framework is made to be suspended on another frame, so that the Lost Thing is about 3 metres tall.
Imogen Keen covering the basic shape of the Lost Thing with foam.
Marie-Martine Ferrari (co-founder of the original Skylark Puppet and Mask Theatre) and I covering the foam shell with muslin.
From above, showing some of the aluminium framework inside.
After the first coat of paint.
The boy’s parents on their sofa under construction.
The mysterious janitor, in an early stage of being made.
The photographs were taken by Tim Raupach. I should have some more in a few days time.
Milo the Clown’s Snow Show
I’ve recently finished a small Frosty the Snowman puppet for The Fool Factory. Frosty will be joining Mini Milo and Milo the Clown in Milo the Clown’s Snow Show, playing at Thredbo’s Fun and Games Room from April 10th through 16th.
