Workshop to present students’ personal puppet creations

Eleven University of Toledo students will present their puppet creations of their own design in a puppetry workshop taught by Erica Frank, visiting assistant professor of theater and costume design.

The workshop will present their puppet creations in performance Friday April 25 and Saturday, April 26 at 7:30 p.m. in the Center for Performing Arts Center Theatre.

“The workshop performance is a showcasing of the work of students in the Puppet Workshop class,” said Angela Riddel, promotions specialist for the College of Communication and the Arts, in an e-mail interview.

“It’s a workshop and a culmination of an entire semester of puppetry in my class,” Frank said.

Frank said students will perform short skits, monologues and sketches with their puppets around a loose framework of a story.

Frank said the working title of the play the workshop has created is “The Immortals.” The performance will be centered on ancient mythologies from around the world.

Students whose work will be featured include: Dale Balister, Andrew Collings, Mackenzi Corns, Crystal Dumont, Zachary Fellhauer, Gina Gass, Clyde Hartley, Victoria Johnson, Jackie Kellett, Richard Quinn and Keely-Rain Battle.

“We are going to tell a brand new story and we’re going to tell the whole thing that we’ve made up on our own and we’re going to tell it through movement of the puppets we’ve created,” Frank said.

Frank said students spent time creating hand puppets throughout the first half of the semester and for the second half of the semester they focused on learning modern Japanese Bunraku Puppetry.

“It’s a new experience for me because I have never worked with puppets before,” said Battle, a third-year theatre major.

“We have built multiple hand puppets along with five Bunraku puppets. Each puppet is to be puppeteered by three people. I’m on the team that puppets the little girl, and going on her journey with her is incredible. Thanks to Erica and her passion for puppets, we have put together a rather impressive work of art.”

Battle said throughout the semester she has become closer to her fellow classmates and the characters they have created.

“In a very short time my class has done a lot,” Frank said. “They’ve written their own scripts to perform with these puppets they’ve made each individually and then we’re coming together as an ensemble and we are doing a short play using the set that we’ve built.”

Frank said the students have a large role in creating the performance.

“In fact one of the greatest secrets of our department is how hands on the student experience is. Our theatre productions have students involved in every respect including leadership roles,” Riddel said.

Frank said the performance is not a fully functional puppet play; however, she said a story will be told entirely through movement.

“Because it is a workshop, it’s not like a written script,” Frank said. “We are telling the entire story through movement. That’s the very nature of puppetry. You’re animating something that’s not normally animated. You can tell so much through movement without even having to speak.”

Frank said puppetry sculpts the space with movement.

“It [puppetry] can invent entire worlds that can say a lot more than what we can say with words,” Frank said.

Frank engages with this workshop in a different way than the students do.

“I am sculpting with them, alongside them. I am directing them. I am co-creating, dividing the work with them,” Frank said.

Frank said her students are guided through the process of creating the puppet performance.

“Erica Frank is a fantastic costume designer who also brings tremendous skill and experience in the creation of puppets, having worked with the Henson Puppet Workshop and several of its projects,” Riddel said. “So we are excited to offer our students yet another way to explore all aspects of theatre.”

Frank said her past interest in sculpture only translated into her obsession with her creations moving.

“Even just watching the puppetry in motion you can see the students have done just an incredible job,” Frank said “Even if it’s not a full length play and completely worked out over the course of time, it’s still very fascinating. It’s a little bit loose, but that’s good, that’s why it’s called a workshop.”

Frank said the workshop is meant to teach students about the art form of puppetry.

“Most people probably react with uncertainty or maybe even discomfort when we talk about using a puppet but the class has opened up not just the students’ minds but also the skills learned can be applicable to work life such as dedication, complete focus and, most importantly, living in the moment as if nothing else but that task matters,” said Gina Gass, a fourth-year theatre major.

Gass said the life-sized puppets require a lot of work to maneuver and animate and that “it’s kind of crazy to watch” the puppets moving.

“The audience is welcome to comment,” Frank said. “… I’m going to talk a lot about our process at this workshop. It’s not a show where you come, sit down and then you leave. It’s a show where you come, sit down and experience and learn a lot about puppetry.”

Frank said “this is just the tip of the iceberg.”

Frank said the fall of 2014 and the spring of 2015 will include more puppetry classes and a full length, main stage puppet play.

“I’m doing the big stage main puppet production, in the spring we’re actually doing a big show of puppetry,” Frank said. “Next year we’re not only exploring puppetry for the theater, which is incredible, I’m also doing puppetry for television.”

Frank said she will be co-teaching a class that will be creating a television pilot utilizing puppetry for WGTE.

Frank said puppetry has found its way into all forms of art. She said she is inspired by the level of work and creativity in the imaginative arts field.

“It’s a way of making fantasy and art come real,” Frank said. “It’s an art form that really fits the title of the imaginative arts.”