Puppetry Home Page


From postmaster@odie.ccs.yorku.ca Tue Oct 25 18:42:07 1994
Date: Tue, 25 Oct 1994 18:31:12 -0400 (EDT)
From: BELLJ@ACFcluster.NYU.EDU
Subject: Re: Is puppetry anachronistic?
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It depends how you define puppetry, which is why I like to think about it
as a form of manipulating objects of the material world, which considerably
broadens the field. Many puppeteers do not like to include other forms
this way (in traditional terms, these include masks, bankelsang and other
picture performance forms, and various other popular theater techniques; in
contemporary forms, performing objects for me include machine performance,
all types of image projection, including this one, etc.)
 
have to go.
john bell
bellj@acfcluster.nyu.edu
 
From postmaster@odie.ccs.yorku.ca Wed Oct 26 00:32:57 1994
Date: Wed, 26 Oct 1994 00:25:54 -0400 (EDT)
From: "E. Bud Wertheim" <72603.734@compuserve.com>
Subject: Is puppetry anachronistic
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To respond to that I would have to know if the query was placed by someone
with access to current puppet theater and the publications such as Puppetry
International ( a new journal of UNIMA ) and other older ones such as the
Puppetry Journal of the Puppeteers of America.
That aside, I would say that current puppetry is far in the forefront of
experimental theater. Anyone who has seen European companies such as Theatre
Drak or witnessed several of the Shadow theaters in the recent International
Puppetry festival in New York would not ask such a question.
Aside from much commentary dealing with socio-political themes, puppet
theater certainly is dealing with all the radical concepts that are
entertained by 'live acting'. In most cases I have found they do a better job
than the 'live' performance of some egomaniac who manages to inject his/her
own personna between the character and the dramatized, failing the playwright
and the audience in the bargain.
Yes, there are traditional forms still being done. I think there is a
place for that too. I would hate to see Punch done in........
- - - Bud
 
 
From postmaster@odie.ccs.yorku.ca Wed Oct 26 08:46:25 1994
Date: Wed, 26 Oct 1994 08:43:15 -0400 (EDT)
From: mozart (Ken Davidian)
Subject: Anachronistic Form?
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Is puppetry anachronistic?
 
Or, to rephrase the question: Are traditional forms of puppetry (Punch
& Judy, Guignol, etc.) living forms of theater or historical
presentations of a dead form of theater?
 
The vitality of a traditional style of puppetry can be measured by the
size of the present day audiences as opposed to the number of new
scripts being presented. Some may say that live theater would be a
dead form of art if the only performances given were those from a
static pool of plays, but others would argue that each performance was
an expansion of the theater art form. It would be hard to argue, in
that instance, that the art of play writing wasn't a dead form, but
the form of performance theater would indeed be alive. If the
audiences do not choose to attend performances (of any kind), then the
performance art would be, in a popular sense, dead. In a more
esoteric sense, as long as one person is performing, whether in front
of an audience or a mirror, then the performance art is still alive.
Assuming that, when two people interact, one is always "performing"
for the other, one could argue that performance art will never die.
(What's a performance? Does improvosation count?)
 
Based on this argument, then, the form of puppet theater performance
must be considered alive as long as the style of puppetry is being
performed to audiences. If new plays are being written for that style
of puppetry as well, then the actual style of puppetry (whether it's
Guignol or P&J) must be considered alive as well.
 
But, what if the show is presented as a historical tribute to a
long-dead style of puppetry? Is the form alive despite the style of
presentation? I would argue that yes, the style is kept alive through
exposure. I would argue that in a future time, when Henson Productions
is a faint memory of the past, and nobody is doing it anymore,
(thereby a "dead" form of puppetry,) a person watching an old episode
of the Muppet Show would be exposed to the form of puppetry we know as
the Muppets and that form would then be identified and "alive" in that
person's mind. If that person decided to use that form of puppetry in
a presentation of whatever, the form would be alive to the audience
members as well.
 
THEREFORE, I would say that, as long as there are performances of
traditional forms of puppetry given to any sized audiences, and in any
context, then the form can be considered "alive".
 
Whew!
 
Ken "Long Winded" Davidian
 
===========================================================================
Ken Davidian Traditional French Puppet Shows
Le Theatre Guignol Presented in French or English
19710 Ridgeland Avenue tel: (216) 676-4331
Cleveland, Ohio 44135-1060 email: kdavidan@lerc.nasa.gov
WWW home page: ftp://france.lerc.nasa.gov/pub/www/kdavidian.html
===========================================================================
 
 
From postmaster@odie.ccs.yorku.ca Tue Oct 25 10:04:20 1994
Date: Tue, 25 Oct 1994 09:59:57 -0400 (EDT)
From: ma@dsd.camb.inmet.com (Malgosia Askanas)
Subject: Is puppetry anachronistic?
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I am curious to what extent you-all think of puppetry as a contemporary
art form. For example, both Ken and Diane work in traditional forms
-- Grand Guignol, Punch & Judy. Do you see these as, in some sense,
_living_ forms, or do you view yourselves as custodians of a
tradition now obsolete? And what about puppetry as a whole?
 
 
- malgosia
 
From postmaster@odie.ccs.yorku.ca Wed Oct 26 14:14:15 1994
Date: Wed, 26 Oct 1994 08:05:11 -1000
From: Robert Peterson <probert@uhunix.uhcc.Hawaii.Edu>
Subject: Re: Is puppetry anachronistic?
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Puppetry certainly is anachronistic. It is a haunted theatre full of
animated skeletons and shadows of ghosts. The beauty of puppetry
is its archaic baggage that defies the fetid decay of objects and becomes
life in the face of death. Have a Happy Holloween everyone.
 
Robert Petersen
University of Hawaii at Manoa
PRobert@uhunix.uhcc.Hawaii.Edu
 
From postmaster@odie.ccs.yorku.ca Wed Oct 26 18:13:22 1994
Date: Wed, 26 Oct 1994 17:57:29 -0400 (EDT)
From: "E. Bud Wertheim" <72603.734@compuserve.com>
Subject: puppetry, anachronism, etc.
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Who can deal with poetry instead of reason, psycho-babble in place of
argument? Please re-read your (e)(o)missions prior to emailing. If they don't
make sense think twice before inflicting others. Some wound easily, others
look to the heavens and cry, "Why me O' great Universe, why me?" My vent
figure (we don't use the 'D' word in our house), Horatio asked me, "How about
life?" to which I answered, "You only have as much as I can spare".
On re-reading it I would think it only makes sense to me. I'm sending it
anyway to illustrate a pernt (Noo Yawkese).
- - - Bud
 
 
From postmaster@odie.ccs.yorku.ca Wed Oct 26 19:26:32 1994
Date: Wed, 26 Oct 1994 19:22:32 -0400 (EDT)
From: ma@dsd.camb.inmet.com (Malgosia Askanas)
Subject: Re: puppetry, anachronism, etc.
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Ah, Mr. Wertheim, you have failed miserably! Your post, causing delight,
only added to the delight of the post you were trying to exorcise. What
could be more-instead-of-reason than claiming that poetry is instead
of reason?
 
-malgosia
 
From postmaster@odie.ccs.yorku.ca Wed Oct 26 20:51:41 1994
Date: Wed, 26 Oct 1994 20:45:10 -0400
From: freshwaterpearls @ attbi.com
Subject: Anachronistic Puppetry?
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I agree with Ken, that if there is an audience for puppetry, puppetry is
alive. Traditional forms such as Punch and Judy are not completely static --
not if they are to be successful with audiences, at any rate. The audiences
of Victorian England's Punch shows wouldn't have the faintest idea what to
make of Judy shouting "COWABUNGA, DUDE!" or making insulting jokes about
Barney. ("Do you know the real reason why dinosaurs went extinct? Because
they heard Barney was going to evolve!") These modern references infuse
vitality into a traditional show and cement the interest of our audience.
That's not to say that the centuries-old traditions and dialogue of Punch
and Judy don't work today. Punch's swazzled voice and stock phrases like
"what a pity!" fascinate and amuse 20th century viewers in the same way they
must have entertained those of the 19th century.
 
Punch and Judy is a traditional show, but the tradition *of* the show is that
it adapts to the times. Social commentary was always a major part of its
humor, and that commentary changed as conditions changed. I think to some
extent all forms of puppetry have changed and adapted to appeal to audiences
of the time. Shadow puppets aren't always leather anymore. Vent figure
apparatuses now can be constructed of high-tech model airplane parts. Hand
puppets can be made of flexible foam materials that didn't exist 50 years
ago. New performance styles are constantly being shaped.
 
I guess my point is that puppetry *is* an evolving art form, and anything
that evolves can't be an anachronism.
 
~ Diane
 
From postmaster@odie.ccs.yorku.ca Sun Oct 30 09:23:34 1994
Date: Sun, 30 Oct 1994 09:11:52 -0500 (EST)
From: ma@dsd.camb.inmet.com (Malgosia Askanas)
Subject: Re: Is puppetry anachronistic?
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I know it's high time for me, too, to try to think about this question
which after all I asked, but I've been too busy to _think_.
Let me try in little thought-chunks.
 
It seems to me that being able to attract audiences is not necessarily
proof of non-anachronism. For example, take Renaissance music.
There is definitely a large audience for this music, but to
compose in that style could, I think, be said to be anachronistic.
The reasons for the interest in this music on the part of audiences
are different than in the case of contemporary music.
When someone composes Renaissance music today, this is always a
gesture of nostalgia or irony or some kind of meta-commentary or
an attempt at a very particular mood-making or a stylistic exercise.
 
I didn't see most of the stuff at the Puppetry Festival in NY; all I
saw where the works in the two puppet-cabaret nights when I was
performing. I would say that of the 20-odd works I saw, there was
only one that I would call non-anachronistic: a piece by Cathy Shaw
(John, remind me please where they were from) called "Anna's Journey".
It is hard for me to put my finger on why exactly this piece seemed
truly contemporary. It was certainly _trying_ to be, and in my
opinion succeeded (in this respect). It was not framed by a
traditional stage of any kind -- it was, to some extent, performed
"in the air"; there were no actual puppets playing the characters;
rather, abstract object-and-light effects were used to enact the
narrative (which had to do with a modern woman's journey to the
underworld to retrieve her dog).
 
Is this a thought-chunk? More some time later.
 
- malgosia
 
From postmaster@odie.ccs.yorku.ca Sun Oct 30 10:33:18 1994
Date: Sun, 30 Oct 1994 10:27:20 -0500
From: Freshwater@aol.com
Subject: Re: Is puppetry anachronistic?
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Maybe we need to define exactly what we're discussing here. Malgosia, what's
your idea of "anachronistic" -- outdated? belonging to an older time and
having no place in contemporary artistic endeavors? or an art form with very
old roots and traditions, yet still malleable and with a forceful voice that
speaks to modern audiences? I agree that puppetry is anachronistic in the
latter sense, but not the former.
 
From postmaster@odie.ccs.yorku.ca Sun Oct 30 10:45:43 1994
Date: Sun, 30 Oct 1994 10:39:23 -0500 (EST)
From: "E. Bud Wertheim" <72603.734@compuserve.com>
Subject: anachronism
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>> It was not framed by a traditional stage of any kind -- it was, to some
extent, performed "in the air"; there were no actual puppets playing the
characters; rather, abstract object-and-light effects were used to enact the
narrative (which had to do with a modern woman's journey to the
underworld to retrieve her dog). <<
 
Bravo! a good thought chunk____ Clearly stated. Although I don't fully agree
that the use of a 'traditional stage' would introduce an anachronism as I
don't think we have USED up the stage as a place of action. When modern
playwrights give up the stage completely and move on to a NEW form of
presentation then will the stage become anachronistic. This is as you stated
in the specific instance of writing a Renaissance style play today. It could
only be done as a spoof and it would indeed be anachronistic. There we are
dealing with style not place.
 
Too bad I couldn't stay in NY for the Puppetry festival long enough to get to
the cabarets. I did get to see a couple of the shadow presentations. I've seen
some of them in Europe a couple of years ago. One of the problems in theater,
not just puppetry, is almost every form has been done over and over again.
When you have been in puppetry as long as I have and you get to see it year
after year the new isn't new. The young people in puppetry are very
enthusiastic about shadows now which have been around for centuries. (I have
in my collection, Wayang Golek and Turkish Karagoz shadow figures) and a few
shadow figures by Fritz Holzberlang, a long deceased shadow puppet enthusiast.
 
It is exciting to see shadows made alive again though, and presented in a
form made popular by the Japanese Bunraku theater. I guess the combination of
anachronistic forms constitutes a new presentation.
- - - Bud
 
 
From postmaster@odie.ccs.yorku.ca Mon Oct 31 07:17:42 1994
Date: Mon, 31 Oct 1994 07:13:32 -0500 (EST)
From: mozart (Ken Davidian)
Subject: Re: anachronistic
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It seems that there were two questions asked:
 
1. Are traditional puppetry styles (P&J, etc.) anachronistic?
 
2. Are traditional puppetry styles a 'living' art form?
 
I guess I responded to the second in my post, and I need to think about
the first.
 
Ken "Too early on Monday morning to think" Davidian
 
 
 
From postmaster@odie.ccs.yorku.ca Mon Oct 31 15:48:52 1994
Date: Mon, 31 Oct 1994 15:38:04 -0500 (EST)
From: ma@dsd.camb.inmet.com (Malgosia Askanas)
Subject: Re: Is puppetry anachronistic?
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John wrote at one time:
 
> In some sense puppetry is old-fashioned, but its separation from
> rationalism and linearity as well as realism is certainly helpful
> at the end of the twentieth century when the thrust of modern
> industrial society is questionable. Peter Schumann's "The Radicality
> of the Puppet Theater" is an interesting essay on this from
> a leftist/anarchist/activist point of view.
 
I wonder, though, to what extent the attraction and comprehensibility
of puppet theater depends on an enclosing rationalistic
and not-quite-so-post-industrial framework. An essential
ingredient of puppetry (classically conceived) is the contrast
between the illusion of life and the fact that the puppets are
inanimate and mechanical; also, that although they are seemingly
_actors_, they are in reality manipulated "from above". It seems
to me that the image of man as a purely mechanical device has
itself lost all vitality and power, and that the second aspect --
of manipulation -- has begun to strike too literally too close to home
to be, so to speak, "funny". We no longer need to be reminded,
for the sake of humility, that we are manipulated by fate; our
need now is perhaps for the opposite: an investigation of the
possibility of non-manipulation.
 
 
- malgosia