From: "Bell, John" <john.bell-AT-uconn.edu>
To: "puptcrit-AT-puptcrit.org" <puptcrit-AT-puptcrit.org>
Date: Wed, 7 Apr 2010 10:47:20 -0400
Subject: Re: [Puptcrit] Roberto Lago at the 1980 World Puppetry Festival


That's a great story about Roberto Lago, who was a great puppeteer!

The show he did about Mondinga Cockroach and her suitors seems likely the same as "Perez and Martina", which Elka Schumann's Dancing Bear Children's Theater did in Vermont in the 1970s (my wife Trudi Cohen and I helped perform that one in numerous schools in northern Vermont).

Frank and Elizabeth Haines from Philadelphia also did a version of the Perez and Martina story as a marionette production in the 1930s....

(Open invitation to all to see "Frank and Elizabeth Haines: An American Puppet Company in the 1930s" and "Punch and Judy: Handpuppets, Politics, and Humor" at the Ballard Institute in Connecticut, now through December 19.)

john bell
________________________________________
From: puptcrit-bounces-AT-puptcrit.org [puptcrit-bounces-AT-puptcrit.org] On Behalf Of Alan Cook [alangregorycook-AT-msn.com]
Sent: Monday, April 05, 2010 3:56 PM
To: puptcrit-AT-puptcrit.org
Subject: [Puptcrit] Roberto Lago at the 1980 World Puppetry Festival in Washngton, DC

Hey, Linda Elbow! I am so glad you remember Roberto at the 1980 Festival.

I first met Roberto Lago (director of Teatro Nahual puppet theater, Mexico City) at the 1948 National Puppetry Festival in Oklahoma City---a rather small event held downtown at the Skirvin Hotel & Skirvin Towers Hotel (connected under the street by a basement tunnel with access to the basement meeting rooms. Some performances were held at a nearby school auditorium (notably the Proctors, Tattermans & Roses) but Martin & Olga Stevens did their year-old Macbeth in the hotel basement--- a small space for a transformative experience. For me, still in high school, this was a major event to attend, and best of all, never had there been so many young puppeteers in attendance, which led to a short-lived PUPPETEEN group within Puppeteers of America, with its own newsletter (mimeographed).

Roberto Lago arrived by bus with Lola Cueto, scheduled to perform, but their show was held back by U.S. Immigration at the Border.  the biggest disapointment
that week. But Roberto & Lola brought a few hand puppets of country boys & girls in their suitase, (1940s) so I was able to purchase one.

In 1961, I arranged a Southern California Tour by Roberto Lago, Pepe Diaz, & Pepe's young son so they could perform a hand puppet workshop/performance at Asilomar (Pacific Grove CA) for the National Puppetry Festival. No Immigration problems with puppets this time. We performed a scene from the story of Mondinga Cockroach and how she chose her husband from various suitors in her village Several of those puppets are now on exhibit at the Treehouse Children's Museum in Ogden, Utah (which just opened last Saturday).

A published children's book in either an English or Spanish Translation, called the Coackroach "Martina". David Jones wrote an English language script of this version which was performed at Children's Fairyland Park's puppet theater in Oakland CA. The script was later included by Plays, Inc in their collection of David's scripts.

Over a decade ago, I learned that there was a Morrocan version of the story, with different characters.


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