Last Friday I entered the magical world of Terrapin Puppet Theatre. Frank Newman is the director of these modern day Pinnochio’s. Frank is a youthful Gepetto and I am introduced to one of his charges, Susie the cow, as she sits, yes, cow-eyed at the back of the adjoining room to Frank’s office.
Terrapin’s latest production is of ‘Love’ a play by the amazing young playwright Finegan Kruckemeyer. The play is about a young boy who must aid his home town as a storm approaches. His job is to assemble the ‘love luggage’ a marvellous term coined by Finnegan and referring to the prized possessions of the people of the town.
What transpires is we discover that more than love luggage in the form of possessions, it is the fact these possessions are the incarnation of our memories that makes them so prized and that ultimately it is love for others and our community that is the thing that binds us and gives our lives meaning.
Frank discusses with me the technical aspects of the production and the x box Kinect which doesn’t really connect with my non-technological mind, however, Frank explains the new frontier of digital puppetry which sees technology combined with puppet and live action to take puppetry a step further.
Frank majored in lighting and sound in his performing arts degree and he’s putting those skills to good use but I was interested to learn that at his time at university Frank was very involved in political activism and not liking the angry and negative ways of achieving protest he decided to make his political activism very cultural with the use of marching bands for example.
So, where did the love of puppetry evolve from?
Frank also studied Commedia dell’arte in Sydney. It was from a character in this that one of the most famous puppets, Punch from Punch and Judy originated.
As I discovered puppetry goes beyond just the assemblage of a character from either wood or cloth. Gravity is a word which ironically is associated with puppets,, not gravity as in heavy meaning, at least not in this production but the scientific laws of gravity.
A puppet’s character reveals itself in it’s qualities of arms that hang heavily down for instance. Gravity can tell us if a character is slow or graceful. We talk about incidental movement when we describe puppets.
A puppeteer and his or her puppet have a symbiotic relationship and the puppet grows from the skill of his puppeteer. It’s then up to the audience to become part of the magic trick and by their imagination to believe. In puppetry, as Frank says, ‘the intangible is given form’.
As noted earlier this production reminds us not of the value of possessions but rather the memory associated with those possessions. I asked Frank what would be his ‘love luggage’ and he told me probably his diaries would be the things he valued most for the memories they contained. He also said that a little toy elephant his grandmother gave him would also rate as his love luggage. It seems fitting in this play about the value of memory that Frank should choose a toy elephant as it’s often acknowledged that elephants never forget.
‘Love’ will be presented at the Theatre Royal on:
Friday 16 September at 11am & 2pm
Saturday 17 September at 11am & 2pm
Sunday 18 September at 2pm
Paula Xiberras
