Date: Wed, 06 Aug 2003 12:00:03 -0400 From: john bell <john_bell-AT-emerson.edu> Subject: PUPT: Ben Brantley gets it wrong (again) about puppets I'd like to point out that despite the great success of Avenue Q on Broadway (it's an amazing show!), mainstream theater criticism is still hobbled by a lack of sophisticated means of analyzing puppet theater (although I have to admit it's getting better, it's getting better all the time). My example: Ben Brantley's New York Times review of Avenue Q (kindly forwarded to Puptcrit by Puppethead on August 1), in which he refers to Rick Lyon's Muppet-style puppets as "sophisticated variations on the sock puppet." Bentley's nomenclature neatly extinguishes or avoids the context of decades of work by Jim Henson and others in the development of hand- and rod-operated puppets with moveable mouths which completely changed the nature of television puppetry in the U.S. and around the world. I'm not sure what a term Brantley should have used, but "sophisticated variations on the sock puppet" is not adequate. It's a bit like saying that digitally projected images are "sophisticated variations" on shadow theater: the statement is technically true, but simplistic and misleading; it begs for much more clarification. yours, john bell --- StripMime Warning -- MIME attachments removed --- This message may have contained attachments which were removed. Sorry, we do not allow attachments on this list. --- StripMime Report -- processed MIME parts --- multipart/alternative text/plain (text body -- kept) text/html --- --- Personal replies to: john bell <john_bell-AT-emerson.edu> --- List replies to: puptcrit-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu --- Admin commands to: majordomo-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu --- Archives at: http://lists.village.virginia.edu/~spoons
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