Institute History
Description
DEAD PUPPET TALK, an original work for actors and puppets, explores the identity crisis of humanity implicit in the interplay between human actors and effigies, and probes the implications of the puppet metaphor for human life. Subtitles “a talking opera,” the piece will alternate between short scenes in which actors debate or contemplate the puppet paradox, and longer musical sequences in which representative puppets act out fragments of dramatic situations symptomatic of the existential crises evoked in the texts. The Music will primarily be a collage of electro acoustically altered early American blues and traditional music. The puppets, roughly half human scale, will continue a design that’s been developed over the course of several productions, a hybrid form that combines stylistic elements of traditional puppet technique with articulations inspired by anatomical dolls and artists’ mannequins." —Roman Paska