The idea for StoryQuest Puppet Theatre actually came about several years ago. The concept for StoryQuest was a story within a story within a story. The general backstory involved a knight, Sir Quest, whose mission was to bravely seek out all of the stories, legends, and tales of the world to share.

Sir Quest was originally introduced in a poem that I wrote as potential lyrics to a song we hoped to use to open our shows. The song and the poem never actually ended up being used in performance, although we kept the concept as a backstory.

You can read the poem here.

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Some of the best ideas for puppet scripts come right out of literature – and specifically out of fables, fairy tales, and folk tales. The Russian tale of Stone Soup is probably the most versatile, and most requested, puppet show that I perform. It is popular because it is simple, interactive, and has a wonderful lesson built right in.

Another benefit of Stone Soup is that it really only requires one puppet, and can easily be adapted to fit nearly any puppet character you care to use or create. I frequently use Miss Millicent, mostly because she is a hand & glove puppet which gives me the ability to handle props more easily, but it can be done with nearly any type of puppet from marionette to hand & rod puppet, or any puppet you wish. Because there’s only one puppet character, and because there’s not much of a set required for the show, it is a really easy show to pack and perform.  As my version of the show requires a great deal of audience participation, it is always helpful to have a front-of-house helper or assistant, but even that is easily adaptable. I’ve used teachers, parents, and even older children as my helpers in the past, with great success, and since the helper doesn’t have to recite any memorized lines  it only take a few moments to prep an instant assistant. Of course, you can script a character-actor as your assistant if you wish to. I’ve also performed this tale in a “Kukla, Fran, & Ollie” style with a live actor and puppet actor interacting with the audience and that can add an additional element of character.

For those unfamiliar with the story of Stone Soup, it’s also relatively simple depending on the version you find. In the original tale, a soldier is returning from battle and stops in a small village hoping to find something to eat. The villagers, led by an old woman, are afraid of having their supplies wiped out by strangers, and are thus reluctant to part with any of their goodies. The soldier is clever, though, and tells the old woman that since she has no food to share, he’ll share a secret recipe he learned on the front lines. He picks up a large stone from her garden, and urging her to put a pot on the fire, drops it in. He tells the old woman that he will make Stone Soup. Stirring the pot in front of the puzzled old woman, he raves at how good the soup is beginning to smell. Of course, it would smell better if they only had carrots to add to it. Suddenly, the old woman remembers some carrots she has stored in her root cellar. As the other villagers approach to see what the stranger is cooking, one by one they are inticed to provide the ingredients – meat, potatoes, a soup bone, etc., until eventually the pot is full of a beautiful soup. At this point, the soldier urges everyone to share a bowl of the soup together. In the end, he secretly pockets the stone, left over in the bottom of the now-empty pot. It will surely come in handy in the next village!

For my story, I use a large Halloween candy cauldron for my soup pot. It’s big, and since it’s plastic it’s not heavy to haul around to shows. I have fitted my pot onto a wooden dowel so it can be attached to the front of the stage, but as long as the kettle is within reach of both the puppet and the audience participants, it can really be placed almost anywhere you wish.

The audience becomes the villagers, and my puppet character the “soldier” in the story. Depending on the puppet, my character is just traveling through and in need of a meal. I have used everything from bean bag veggies made out of felt to plastic decorative veggies purchased at a local craft store. I switched to the plastic ones when one of the children in the audience innocently blurted out “I think this is a potato but I’m not sure!” in the middle of the show, pointing out the need for more realism in my vegetable props! I have my assistant hand out the props to the audience prior to the beginning of the show, identifying them by name as they’re handed out to eliminate any confusion when they’re called for by the puppet. I also hand out an empty plastic pitcher to add pretend water to the soup. The only prop I don’t hand out is the stone itself. That is preset onstage in view of the audience.

As the story begins, my puppet indicates the desire for a meal. But where to find one? No one in the audience has anything for a meal. (Of course, the audience has been prompted to refuse to share their props at first.) The puppet finds the stone and drops it into the pot with a loud “clunk”. Using a hand & glove puppet allows me to use a real stone (I buy the decorative kind from aquarium supply stores or garden stores usually as they’re the right size and shape, but you could use any largish stone you find as long as you clean it up really well). If I have to use another variety of puppet, I either use a papier mache stone on a rod and a sound effect, or have my assistant help by dropping the stone in the pot for me.

Watching the stone “boil,” the puppet character is thrilled. Of course, it would boil faster if there was only water in the pot. But where will we find a pitcher of water? Enter our audience member with the pitcher. I use a small step-stool to help smaller children reach the kettle, and I usually suggest giving the pitcher to an older child since it requires a bit of imagination to carefully pour the imaginary water into the kettle without spilling it.

I try to invoke all of the senses at this point:  The soup smells wonderful, but would smell better with onions; it sounds wonderful, but would sound better with carrots; it looks wonderful, but would look better with potatoes; it tastes wonderful but would taste better with peppers. As each request is made, the appropriate audience members are called to come up and drop their props into the pot. I carry enough veggies for everyone to have one with smaller audiences. In larger audiences, I ask pairs or groups to share and come up together. Often, this can be done with older siblings helping younger ones recognize that their vegetable has been requested and assisting them with bringing them to the stage.

Once our Stone Soup is finished, my puppet pulls out a bowl and spoon, ready to eat. Suddenly realizing that so many others helped in the soup’s creation, the audience is urged to hold out their imaginary bowls too, so they can share in the soup. A symbolic wave of a soup ladel usually does the trick to serve everyone!

I always end the show with my puppet character thanking everyone for helping to make the soup. It is the simple act of sharing that has brought us all together as an audience, and the simple act of sharing that has turned an ordinary garden stone into a delicious pot of soup! I end by having my assistant fish out the stone, which my puppet character decides to keep for later. You never know when it will come in handy again. Puppet and stone exit the stage, leaving my assistant to do one last walk through the audience collecting any stray props that might have been missed.

As I mentioned in the beginning of this article, I have performed this same skit a variety of ways. It adapts well to Halloween (we make a Witch’s Brew instead of soup, and I use eyeballs, spiders, pumpkins, and the like instead of vegetables) and just about any character you want (I typically use Miss Millicent who is an older woman, but I’ve also used a Witch, a generic male puppet character, and an actual soldier puppet). There’s a lot of room to improvise, so it’s a terrific show to do last minute when there’s not time to refresh lines or rehearse. In fact, Stone Soup is not only an audience favorite, but it’s one of my favorite shows to perform as well!

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!