From: Michael Moynihan <mmoynihan-AT-wi.rr.com> To: puptcrit-AT-puptcrit.org Date: Thu, 13 Nov 2008 17:54:52 -0600 Subject: Re: [Puptcrit] Bread Puppet addition "Puppet theatre, Peter Schumann, says is 'anarchic and untamable by nature." Its materials are cheap - paper, rags, and wood scraps. Its history is subversive. Its stage is the street.' Schumann has created a prophetic, political and religious theatre for our time." http://www.cbc.ca/ideas/features/bread_puppet/index.html I find this tread very interesting and vital for the same reasons I had for making and attending live theatre, the thread character=92s opinions and the story present conflict, unresolved questions and opportunities for learning. It can, indeed, be painful. And that is very, very good for puppetry/theatre. In the second play I was ever in, the one and only high school play I did, I spoke the lines, "Pain makes man think. Thought makes man wise. Wisdom makes life endurable"* In this thread some are maintaining the late, great Marshall McLuhan's explanation that "The Medium is the Message". Theatre/Pupperty IS the message. And the message is the puppetry. And if it is not, then that artist has abandoned the art, their talent, their audience and self. Is what is presented is then, fundamentally, a lie? Other's in this thread are maintaining the late, great Marshall McLuhan's pun, "The Medium is the Massage". Then, puppetry is the massage. The massage relaxes and tricks the audience into a sense that everything is all right. Many on this list seem fine with the sledge hammer messages that often are employed by practitioners of so called "Puppet Ministry" Punch and Judy shows are obvious in their political messages, yet I doubt many practitioners are advocate of the anarchy and violent methods of the puppet superstar. We could choose any or every show we have ever done or seen and do the political, personal, public, imaginative, intuitive and literal message analysis machine. If you do not automatically now do it, I recommend it. My college Theatre professor, the late Dorothy Sainsbury-Steinmetz, engrained in me that if as a performer I did not know every possible interpretation of every line I uttered on stage, or, as a director, the possible interpretation of the entire text, then I better plan on being ambushed by critics and audience members whose values, life experiences, consciousness differed from my own. Context and intention can usually address misinterpretation. However a rocket scientist, a psychologist and a 19th century cowpoke might all visualize something quite different when they hear an actor say =93All the world=92s a stage=94. I=92m just sayin=92 - moynihan - _______________________________________________ List address: puptcrit-AT-puptcrit.org Admin interface: http://lists.puptcrit.org/mailman/listinfo/puptcrit Archives: http://www.driftline.org
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