The Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything

One of my favorite Halloween books for storytelling purposes is “The Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything” by Linda Williams.

The story involves an old woman who is approached by several disembodied articles of clothing as she makes her way home. One by one she admonishes the clothing, telling them that she’s not afraid of them. The clothes, and finally a pumpkin-head, follow her home, where she finds a use for them, turning them into a scarecrow to scare away the birds.

For the puppet version, I use Miss Millicent, my resident “little old lady” puppet. A quick shopping trip to a thrift store turned up matching pairs of pants, shirts, hats, shoes and gloves, in extra large sizes. I begin my storytelling with my front of house “helper” handing out one set of the clothing, including a plastic jack’o'lantern head, to members of my audience. As the story progresses, these audience participants will be the puppeteers of the floating clothing.

Miss Millicent tells her tale, sharing a story of a previous Halloween with her audience. As she mentions each article of clothing, she encourages the child puppeteering that article to come forward and attempt to scare her. In the original story, each item has its own sound effect (One shirt goes SHAKE SHAKE, one pair of pants goes WIGGLE WIGGLE, etc.) and she encourages them to use those sounds and act them out – the sillier the better.

Since Miss Millicent is not afraid of anything, she tells each of them in turn that she’s not frightened, and the child is encouraged to hand their prop over to the helping hand.

Miss Millicent then tells the children that the clothes followed her home. Miss Millicent wonders what to do with the floating clothes that seem to want to scare somebody. She suddenly has a brilliant idea! One by one, the assistant hands the shirt, pants, hat, gloves, shoes, and jack’o'lantern to Miss Millicent, who whispers her idea to them, then passes them back stage.

After all the clothes are all offstage, Miss Millicent lets the audience in on her idea. She’s encouraged the clothes to become a scarecrow, to scare the birds away. As she tells them about her plan, the “clothes” reemerge, on an actor playing the scarecrow! The scarecrow is of course dressed ahead of time in the second set of clothes, with a painted pumpkin face.

We first performed this skit at a nursing home for a Halloween party for the families of the residents. My mother bravely volunteered to serve as the scarecrow, even allowing me to paint her face as a jack’o'lantern! My front of house assistant, a member of the nursing home volunteer staff, gleefully handed out clothing to the kids and gave them their cues. One of the fun things about this story as a puppet sketch is that it really ISN’T scary. In fact, the punchline is just how NOT SCARY the clothes really are, at least to little old ladies (and kids). This makes it an excellent story for younger audiences or mixed audiences where smaller children might be easily frightened. Audience participation makes the story move along nicely, and kids can even team up on things like shoes and gloves to allow everyone to play a role.

Of course, the real star of the production is the scarecrow! Finding someone exciting and enthusiastic who is willing to pop out in outlandish costume at the end of the story is a plus. My mother was wonderful! Having been a school teacher previously, and used to her daughter’s puppetry (my family frequently gets sucked into my shows in one way or another) she was a fabulous scarecrow. As an added bit of audience participation, you could have the kids flap their arms like birds, pretending to be “scared” by the scarecrow, or you could incorporate a crow puppet into the show if you have enough puppeteers (or hands). In my case, the scarecrow made “his” appearance, mingling with the audience, shaking hands and wishing everyone a happy Halloween. “He” then handed out treats and sent everyone on to their next event for the evening.

There are lots of Halloween stories and books out there, but this one is really well-suited as a puppet show. It involves audience participation (always a plus) a not-so-frightening plot that’s terrific for younger audiences, and a fabulous “surprise” at the end. If you’re looking for a book to turn into a puppet script, I recommend this story. Even if you actually create puppets for all of the “characters” it lends itself wonderfully to the world of puppetry!