It’s time to create another puppet. For some reason, a beatnik character keeps churning around in my head. As with any puppet, creating a character on paper is the first step. I use MS Paint to “draw” my characters, since you wouldn’t be able to tell my puppet design from a bunch of shapes drawn in kindergarten class otherwise!
My plan is to use the Project Puppet Punto pattern for my puppet’s elongated head. I’m going to use non-pill fleece for this puppet’s “skin” since antron (Muppet) fleece is a bit expensive and harder to come by. I’m on a budget and mainly doing this puppet for practice. His hair and goatee/moustache will be fake fur in a dark color, and his turtleneck a fun courderoy fabric I found. For his vest, I’m going to use a tapestry-type fabric I found at my local fabric store.
My initial plan is to paint his eyes onto the back of the glasses so they show through as slits. I may try a few tests to see how this works. If I don’t like the effect, I can always make typical ping-pong ball eyes and put the glasses on over them.
I also want him to have a bongo (as he should) so I plan to either purchase a small toy drum, or make one out of a plastic container. It depends on availability of materials.
He’ll have removeable arm rods, so I’ll be able to have him hold the drum, or have his arms free to move, whichever I choose.
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!
While attending college at Illinois State University, I was lucky enough to enroll in a Puppetry Arts class. The class was fairly basic, and included some of the rich history of puppetry, some basic performance skills, and some very basic puppet-making. One of the “projects” we did involved very simple “Balloon Marionettes.” We did a group performance using these very simple puppets as part of our assignment.
After college, I had the fortune of traveling with the group “Up with People” for a year. We traveled all over the United States and Europe, performing in a musical show and performing “community service” activities in the places we visited. One of the things we frequently were asked to do was to appear in local classrooms, discussing our group. If you are unfamiliar with “Up with People,” their main purpose is to bring the world together through music and performance. We frequently discussed diversity and tolerance of those who are different when we went into those classrooms.
I was asked by a school teacher in Germany to “teach” a class for her while I was visiting. She wanted a simple workshop that would tell her students what the group I was traveling with was all about. I had told her that I had studied Elementary Education in college, and had even taught for a short time. I also had told her I was a puppeteer. A light bulb went off over my head, and a simple puppetry workshop was created.
Balloon marionettes are among the simplest of puppets to build.
Required Materials:
Assorted Balloons (multiple shapes, sizes and colors are best)
2 Identical balloons (Any color, size, shape is fine, but the two should be the same)
Card-stock
Construction paper, tissue paper, or any type of drawing paper
Crayons, markers, or paint
Scissors
Clear tape or glue
Yarn or string
Popsicle sticks or unsharpened pencils
Anything else you’d like to use for decoration (buttons, beads, etc.) as long as it’s small enough and light enough to be taped or glued to a balloon.
For the instructor’s puppets, make two identical marionettes. It is easiest if you make one ahead of time, then duplicate it’s creation as instruction for the class.
Blow up the balloon. Make sure it’s large enough to work with, but don’t over inflate it or it will pop. If a balloon breaks, try again with another! Knot the end.
Draw feet onto a piece of card stock. If working with younger students, it can be helpful to have them pre-drawn and ready to cut out. The feet should be slightly larger than the balloon. Older students can get creative and make webbed feet, paws, shoes, sandals, or bare-feet. Whatever they feel inspired to create!
Cut out the feet and use a small dab of glue or a loop of tape to attach them to the bottom side of the balloon (the side away from the knot). This should allow the balloon to stand up on it’s own. (Remember that glue takes awhile to dry. If you are short of time, use small pieces of clear tape to hold the feet in place.)
Draw, paint, or cut out eyes, noses, ears, and other features. Painting or drawing directly on the balloon takes longer to dry and can cause the balloon to pop if you press too hard. If your marionette pops, it is easier to rebuild if you don’t have to draw or paint a second time. Use clear tape or a dab of glue to fasten the features to the surface of the balloon.
Cut a piece of yarn or string so that it is long enough to extend from the floor to about waist high. Again, string may be pre-cut for younger students. You may also choose to use a table top as a stage. Make your string enough to extend from the tabletop to about shoulder high if you do.
Tie one end of the string to the knot on top of the balloon. Fasten the other end to a popsicle stick or unsharpened pencil as a control.
Performance is rather simple with a balloon marionette. Walking involves a “bouncing” movement. Practice bouncing your marionettes, turning them to speak to one another, and generally moving them around. Lengthen or shorten strings as necessary and reattach any features that cause problems.
Now that you’ve built your marionettes, it’s time to perform your show! The concept is simple and mostly improvised. The following “script” is a loose outline only:
Instructor: (using two identical balloon marionettes - Puppets enter stage and begin to interact) How are you doing? How have you been? What game are we playing? etc.
Each student enters the scene with their marionette, one at a time.
Student: (to the instructor’s puppets) Hey, that game looks fun! Can I join in? (or something similar)
Instructor: No, you can’t! This game is only for blue balloons (or whatever). Go away! You’re too round (or red, or your eyes are too big, or you have bare feet, whatever).
The student takes their marionette to another part of the stage away from the insructor’s puppets, and begins to “play” (bounce).
One by one, each student approaches the instructor’s marionettes, is turned away, and goes to join the ever-growing group of puppets “playing” (bouncing) over to the side.
Instructor: (in conversation between the two identical puppets)
Puppet 1: Hey, this game is getting boring!
Puppet 2: It sure is. What else can we do?
Puppet 1: I don’t know, but look at that group over there! They sure look like they’re having a good time!
Puppet 2: They do! I’d rather be playing with them!
Puppet 1: Me too! Do you think they’d let us?
Puppet 2: I don’t know. Let’s ask them.
The instructor’s puppets “bounce-walk” over to the group
Puppet 1: Hey, your game looks like fun! Can we play?
Puppet 2: Yes, we’d like to join you!
Either as a spokesperson for the group or all together, the students should welcome the instructor’s marionettes into their group. The entire class then ends up “playing” (bouncing) together in a bunch!
After taking bows, ask the students to take their seats with their marionettes for a post performance discussion!
Diane began performing as a puppeteer when she was only six years old. Her first marionette, Clippo the Clown, a gift from her Grandmother, accompanied Diane to school every year through college. As an adult, Diane began making and performing hand puppets. She writes the shows, fabricates the puppets and props, performs all of the puppetry, and even serves as her own lighting and sound engineer!
Dog decided to roll in smelly something. Dog rolled into retention pond instead. Dog gets bath. Dog looks smug & self satisfied (but clean)!about 4 days agofrom mobile web
It’s time to create another puppet. For some reason, a beatnik character keeps churning around in my head. As with any puppet, creating a character on paper is the first step. I use MS Paint to “draw” my characters, since you wouldn’t be able to tell my puppet design from a bunch of shapes drawn in kindergarten class otherwise!
Diane began performing as a puppeteer when she was only six years old. Her first marionette, Clippo the Clown, a gift from her Grandmother, accompanied Diane to school every year through college. As an adult, Diane began making and performing hand puppets. She writes the shows, fabricates the puppets and props, performs all of the puppetry, and even serves as her own lighting and sound engineer!
