Puppets show the way in Portugal

I am now safely back home in Australia. I flew out of Lisbon in the nick of time. Soon after leaving, the airport, along with all social services closed down for a 24-hour strike as Portugal struggles against proposed austerity measures.  The strike was followed closely by today's United Nations International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women.
I had a great three-week European lecture and workshop tour and belief in the power this work has on an international audience has been strongly reinforced. The next conference where we're demonstrating the power of puppetry in communication is the Drama Victoria Conference in Melbourne on 1-2 December.

Lisbon's best kept puppetry secret

This morning I visited the 'Museu da Marioneta' (puppetry museum) in Lisbon, where I was taken on a guided tour by its delightful director, Maria Jose Machado Santos. The museum, founded in 1987 by Puppet Company of S. Lourenço, is based in an ancient convent near the centre of Lisbon.  Museu da Marioneta is dedicated to the interpretation and dissemination of the history of puppetry and features puppets from around the world, while at the same time allowing a special focus on Portuguese puppetry.

Although the museum has a wonderful collection of everything from traditional Javanese Wayang Golek and Kulit through to a special section of modern Portuguese puppets and animation, I was also invited into the vault, in the secret underbelly of the museum, to view it's hidden treasures. These included some rare artifacts from every continent and a massive collection of Asian puppets. Unfortunately the space in this beautiful museum is limited, so most of it's unique collection go unseen by the public in the vault. The only way for this to change is expansion, but with the uncertain European financial climate, it's going to be a long time before I can see this happening. But it's certainly well worth a visit to anyone passing through Lisbon.  In fact if you get hold of the director, maybe you'll be fortunate enough to get your own guided tour like I had today. If you can't get there, you can still experience a virtual tour of their international puppetry collection here!

Little Angel puppeteer now Hollywood director

Former British puppeteer, Joe Wright has come of age. His parents, John and Lyndie, founded and ran Islington's famous Little Angel Theatre. Although John Wright (who was 65 when Joe was born and died in 1991) could be distant, for Joe and his sister Sarah childhood was a creative whirl of making puppets and making up stories for them. 

Since leaving the puppets behind, Joe has gone on to make a career for himself as a successful Hollywood director. Although claiming to be an undiagnosed dyslexic at school, Joe's first feature film, Pride and Prejudice, earned four Oscar nominations; his second, Atonement, collected six; his third, The Soloist, based on the true story of a homeless violinist, was less successful.

Joe, who is married to Sitarist Anoushka Shankar, Ravi Shankar's daughter, discusses his life and influence growing up performing with his parents at the Little Angel Theatre in a new BBC Television report here!  This year also happens to mark the 50th anniversary of the Little Angel. You can read my previous post about this and the Suspense Puppet Festival, which I attended recently in London, here!

Muppets back in the news

Even though the new Muppet Movie is advertised to launch on 5 January 2012, the Face Book Disney Muppet site promises a midnight launch on Wednesday this week together with a launch of the original soundtrack. Very confusing, I know! But the marketing machine for the movie has begun in earnest with many promos and even featuring The Muppets on Game Shows, which unfortunately can only be viewed in the US. However there also seem to be many spoofs coming out, which is even adding to the hype and publicity for the film. You can view the Pig with the Froggy Tattoo Trailer here and a Muppet horror spoof trailer called 'SAW' here.

Women and Paper at ECIS in Lisbon

It was a great privilege for me to work with seven international school teachers in our initial two-day pre-conference workshop here at the European Council for International Schools' Conference (ECIS) in Lisbon, Portugal. During the two-day workshop we focused using paper, objects and our bodies to communicate key messages to our target audiences. We begin with Brain Gym exercises to get our mind and bodies aligned and communicating effectively. This is followed by warm-up games to get the participants into a safe grounded space. The two-day journey is a profound one, which helps participants tell their own stories and think on their feet through much improvised short performances. What always astonishes me is the power of the 'animated object' on our psyche and how deeply we are affected by the medium. Every workshop I do gives me further insight into this magical world.

The strange thing is that while I'm writing this report, I am sitting in an auditorium listening to NASA veteran of four space flights, Steve Smith, discussing how he followed his dream of thirty years wanting to become a NASA astronaut, besides being initially turned down five times, before being allowed onto the program. He currently serves as the NASA International Space Station Program Liaison to the European Space Agency. For more information about Steve, check out the ECIS website.

Rico raps with Snoop Dog

Remember Rico, the Air New Zealand rodent that drove the customers crazy on the long haul flights some time back? (If you don't, you can find it here!) Well now there are some new clips up on You Tube featuring the rodent in new adventures. In the short clip above he makes a debut appearance with the legendary Snoop Dog, as they lay down a track together, "Hello Sunshine," with a groovy beat. The making of the Snoop clip, which really doesn't reveal much, except for Hollywood girls all over the puppet, can be found here!
And there are now more...  Rico hypnotises American glamour girl Lindsay Lohan on the sky couch and finds out her deep secrets.  He also hypnotises Night Rider star, David Hasselhoff. (Click on their names to view them).

Little Angel Theatre - the centre of puppetry action

The theme of this year's Suspense Festival in London was 'Politics and Puppetry', although not every performance was overtly political. The centre of the action of the eleven different venues was the Little Angel Theatre in Islington and it's director, Peter Glanville has been running this bi-annual festival since 2009.
This year also happens to be the fiftieth anniversary of the Little Angel Theatre, which was founded by South African puppeteer, John Wright in 1961. Watch the BBC clip here!

On Saturday I saw a charming new production of Plucked.. a true fairytale, by Invisible Thread (formerly Faulty Optic) at the Little Angel. Plucked looks at the roles of older women in myth and fairy tale and combines some expressive large bunraku-style puppets.

Last night was the festival climax with the puppet Grinder Cabaret at the Jackson's Lane Theatre. The show was compared by the hilarious Nina Conti. Nina is one of the world greatest ventriloquists and certainly top in the UK. Here's a clip of Nina at the Melbourne comedy festival last year. Meeting up after the show, she was still carrying her 'Monk' and was rushing off to get a plane for a gig in New York today. Other great cabaret acts were 'Clementine the Living Fashion Doll' and Blind Summit. You can catch their short performance here!

My few days at the Suspense Festival were certainly a highlight and I'd recommend everyone to keep a lookout for their next edition in 2013.

Suspense Puppetry Festival in London

London is abuzz with puppetry this week. I arrived rather jet lagged, after a 24 hour flight, yesterday in a cold, wintery, but welcoming London, right in the middle of the Suspense Puppet Festival and a myriad of great performances.
Staying with friends in north London is not too far from the Little Angel Theatre, where the centre of the action is taking place. In fact, I'm participating in a 'Puppetry in Politics' symposium at the Little Angel today, which is examining how puppetry has been used to change our world, past, present and maybe even future trends.
There's even find a write up in 'The Stage' covering Suspense Festival and events here! Keep posted for some of my personal experiences and reviews from London. 

If you want to find out even more about what's happening in the UK puppetry scene, you can find the British publication, Animations Online here!