Saturday, 30 January 2010
Walking into Fremantle’s Spare Parts Puppet Theatre, I realised with a wonder that I have never seen any shows here before. Surprising, considering puppetry is one of the earliest forms of story telling, and Perth had not too long ago hosted the 20th UNIMA (Union Internationale de la Marionnette) Congress & World Puppetry Festival.
The lobby and theatre was filled with chatty tykes and their corralling parents and/or grandparents, and the small stride shuffle eventually brought the audience full into the reasonably sized theatre facing a dark sectionally blocked stage.
Despite the large, human-sized puppets that had awed us earlier on display in the lobby, when the play opened (various panels were revealed and redressed throughout to progress the story), you realised that on the whole, puppets are small, and as this tale was particularly dealing with toys, the producers had chosen to give us proportionate as opposed to exaggerated.
SPPT’s retelling of Margery Williams’ beloved tale had a distinctly contemporary, casual feel as the ubiquitous Damon Lockwood and fellow actor Ben Russell, expressively and with comedy duo finesse voiced two introductory characters (an action figure and a night light glow worm, not mentioned in the book) who told of Christmas, the threat of new toys displacing them and ultimately, questioning each other on what it means to be Real.
The Velveteen Rabbit (voiced by Michelle Robin Anderson) a cuddly soft toy with a shortened base to replace his back legs and an inquisitive innocence, was a Christmas present delightfully realised, and had there been versions of him on sale as part of the theatre merchandise, I would have no doubt that just about every parent would have been badgered incessantly to please, please please! get one.
The narrative played around with sections of the plot and dialogue (the original story looks to be set around the turn of the 20th century, when the threat of scarlet fever was much more prevalent) but overall, its embellishments were more for humour and characterisation. I was reminded of Pixar’s Toy Story on a number of occasions, which no doubt owes a debt to some of this story’s themes.
With a running time of under an hour (before there would be too much seat squirming by those with a short attention span) it nonetheless captivated its chosen audience and was a cute piece of fun theatre for the grown ups too.
An oft-spoken child’s wish brought to life.
Walking into Fremantle’s Spare Parts Puppet Theatre, I realised with a wonder that I have never seen any shows here before. Surprising, considering puppetry is one of the earliest forms of story telling, and Perth had not too long ago hosted the 20th UNIMA (Union Internationale de la Marionnette) Congress & World Puppetry Festival.
The lobby and theatre was filled with chatty tykes and their corralling parents and/or grandparents, and the small stride shuffle eventually brought the audience full into the reasonably sized theatre facing a dark sectionally blocked stage.
Despite the large, human-sized puppets that had awed us earlier on display in the lobby, when the play opened (various panels were revealed and redressed throughout to progress the story), you realised that on the whole, puppets are small, and as this tale was particularly dealing with toys, the producers had chosen to give us proportionate as opposed to exaggerated.
SPPT’s retelling of Margery Williams’ beloved tale had a distinctly contemporary, casual feel as the ubiquitous Damon Lockwood and fellow actor Ben Russell, expressively and with comedy duo finesse voiced two introductory characters (an action figure and a night light glow worm, not mentioned in the book) who told of Christmas, the threat of new toys displacing them and ultimately, questioning each other on what it means to be Real.
The Velveteen Rabbit (voiced by Michelle Robin Anderson) a cuddly soft toy with a shortened base to replace his back legs and an inquisitive innocence, was a Christmas present delightfully realised, and had there been versions of him on sale as part of the theatre merchandise, I would have no doubt that just about every parent would have been badgered incessantly to please, please please! get one.
The narrative played around with sections of the plot and dialogue (the original story looks to be set around the turn of the 20th century, when the threat of scarlet fever was much more prevalent) but overall, its embellishments were more for humour and characterisation. I was reminded of Pixar’s Toy Story on a number of occasions, which no doubt owes a debt to some of this story’s themes.
With a running time of under an hour (before there would be too much seat squirming by those with a short attention span) it nonetheless captivated its chosen audience and was a cute piece of fun theatre for the grown ups too.
An oft-spoken child’s wish brought to life.
Posts
I like the old theatre space there, though I must admit to not being a big puppet fan as they are usually accompanied by falsetto voices or baby type talk. I attended a water puppet show in Vietnam where I understood little of what was going on, but just enjoyed the skills of the puppeteers for the first hale of the show until it became a bit repetitive. I am not a big fan of animations either. Perhaps that shows a lack of imagination on my part or a refusal to accept the absurd?? Dunno, but I still enjoyed the entertaining read. Jaymez
ReplyDelete