Puppets - Stop Motion: Passion, Process and Performance - page 41

A puppet and its operators from Japanese Bunraku: the senior puppeteer, the dezakai, is
uncovered (Saemi Takahashi).
performances aimed at adults, with songs and comments about relationships echoing the
relationship between the puppet and the puppeteer. But once again, there is the puppeteer
with his hand clearly up the puppet's back, and does it matter, not one jot. The trick is part
of the show. It would be interesting to see this i lmed with the puppeteer hidden. The show
would be limp indeed, and lose its point.
The hugely inl uential show The Lion King , directed by Julie Taymor, now running all over the
world, has opened eyes to puppetry of all descriptions. The show is innovative for using puppets
on a big commercial stage, although most of the techniques are borrowed and jazzed up from
dif erent cultures and histories ( Screen Play used many of the same techniques). There are
nods towards Bunraku, Javanese shadow puppets, rod puppets and all manner of techniques,
mixed with a colourful dose of Broadway. Beyond some dazzling stage tricks and illusions,
audiences seem to have responded to the line between performer and puppet pretty much
disappearing. It is hard to tell where one i nishes and another starts. The actors performing the
zebras, for example, have an animal-like structure built around their bodies, and
move the legs of the zebras with rods. You see a seamless blend. With some of the
main characters, such as the meerkat, the operator, rather than being dressed in
the convention of invisibility, black, is a character in his own right, with a colourful
costume that contrasts vividly with the meerkat puppet strapped to his front.
Children seem to have no trouble grasping this convention of watching the puppet
giving a tremendously detailed performance, while watching the performer giving