I have not seen much children’s theatre, and my knowledge of puppetry is pretty much limited to having read Pinocchio and seen Being John Malkovich. Also, I am not a child, nor do I have any. I am certainly not the target audience for Rapunzel, presented by Pamella O’Conner.
Which is all to say that I didn’t like the show all that much. It is certainly not that the show was simply bad; I do think that most of the children were interested, as were their parents, I’m sure, and I am glad that they had the opportunity to experience live theatre and the specific magic of puppets. I just thought that the show was ultimately rather soulless.
Let’s start with the script. What do you do with a fairy tale, in our modern age? Does it have to be modernized or moralized or scrutinized to death? Or should it just be told simply, assuming that whatever out-dated moral lessons of the story will not harm the child hearing the story? I don’t know. It’s a complicated question. I do know that I found it uncomfortable to be presented with the stereotypes of Rapunzel without any thought (that I could see) into how these myths could be viewed more expansively, more creatively. Instead, we are presented with the wife whose unreasonable demands land her husband in trouble, the prince whose offer of marriage leads to the happy ending, et cetera. I’m not saying that every fairy tale has to be updated or made politically correct or whatever, I’m just saying that in this case, the issue seemed unexamined, and I noticed it. A few things were indeed brought out—the old lady, here called Mother Gothel, is called an old fairy, and has a strong connection to the earth and to plants and to the air. But this connection is not explored and her need for a child to love and protect and to raise as her own is likewise ignored. I wanted the play to ask why! The character was really interesting, but frustratingly unexamined. Maybe kids just want the story they know, I’m no expert, but if we can also give them something more, isn’t a shame not to?
At any rate, it seems to me that there are three things to hope for in a children’s show, and none of them were espesially well represented at the performance I saw. One is lots of giggling. This show had a little, but not much. Second is children getting involved and talking to the performers. Now, clearly this is not the best model for all children’s shows, but I think it would have been appropriate for this show, and in my opinion, would have strengthened it considerably. Near the end of the show, O’Conner did ask the children to echo Mother Gothel’s sing-song chant, which they did enthusiastically, but I wonder why this device was not employed from the old woman’s first entrance! The last thing I look for in a great kid’s show is that awed gasp from all the children at some effect that simply cannot be achieved through television or other mediums they may have experienced. There were a few moments that seemed designed to do this, but they did not really work. (Actually, some of those moments were transitions to shadow puppets, but the shadow puppets were actually a little confusing; my companion was not very familiar with shadow puppets and did not recognize them as such, and I am sure that many of the children saw nothing but a movie screen on which the colorless figures moved very jerkily for some unknown reason. At the end of the performance, O’Conner showed the kids how some of the puppets—including the shadow puppets— worked, and I found myself wondering if the show would have been more effective if that demonstration had taken place before performance rather that after. I think being “in” on the magic can actually enhance the experience in a show like this, rather than detract from it.) Rapunzel is a familiar story, and although it has many variations, we all basically know what is going to happen, so it seems to me that the opportunity in making it a great show—rather than just a story-book on stage—is in reexamining the themes and characters of the myth itself. I say either take this dark and disturbing story and really explore that direction (although the resulting show may not be for children!) or take this dark and disturbing story and push against it to create something that finds real humor and magic through the darkness. I’ll never forget a production I saw of Cinderella, another dark story, that featured a lot of slapstick, including some darkly funny stuff like toes being chopped off and tossed into the audience (which the kids absolutely loved) as well as silly antics that had the audience in stitches, with many children yelling at the performers (“Look behind you! The other way! No, the other way!”), and also had some of the quietest, most magical and creative moments I had ever seen on stage. And those moments worked in large part because they had been earned: The show had already drawn the audience in with laughter and therefore allowed us to be open to the possibility that a few bunches of newspaper could take on a shape and a life of their own…
I guess that’s what I’m driving at, really. O’Conner’s Rapunzel is not a bad show; it has some interesting puppets and O’Connor is clearly a talented artist, as is Lauren Fortuna, her assistant on this show. They both interacted with the puppets and the audience in interesting ways, and integrated direct presentation to the audience with interaction through the puppets. The show is perfectly fine, and certainly many people got a lot out of it. But it did not offer much in the way of ideas, and as a result did not grasp my attention. I thought the show simply lacked the kind of creativity that leads to surprising choices and delightful insights. Without that creativity, it is not much more than a mildly amusing and distracting way to introduce children to puppets; the real leaps of the imagination will have to happen somewhere else. Hopefully some of the children will have left having found enough inspiration to do that themselves.
~Willie Repoley
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