Closing Weekend, Briefly

Closing weekend was a blast. I want to write about it in more detail when I have a little more time. In the mean time, here's the show summaries:

Thursday: Over My Head
Archie (Dave as puppet Tad) has everything he wants: a great job, a great girlfriend. He’s ready to propose, but his girlfriend Darlene (Tara) says “no”. Then his office burns down and Archie’s wanted for arson he didn’t commit. Hardened and world weary, he starts a new life in Morocco leading camel tours. But when a new Darlene (Amy as puppet Rita) comes into his life, Archie learns to love again.

Friday: Tattoo Star
When Timothy (Christian) rockets to super stardom as a psychedelic tattoo artist, he gets everything he ever wanted: fame, money, women, fans. But he loses his one true love, Angela (Tara as puppet Rita). When an experiment with glow-in-the-dark ink produces horrific results, he finally realizes fame isn’t what he thought it was.

Saturday: This is the End… Or is It? Carl (Clay), a performer, and George (Alan as puppet Marcel), a writer, get divorced. Then Carl’s one man show closes. All Carl wants to do is get away from it all to Nepal to climb Mount Everest, but his producer Glen (Mandy as puppet Dungeon) sends George along so the duo can write Carl’s new show Ms. Nepal. Is it really the end of their marriage?

Protagonists, Jokes, Conspiracies

(Check out the guy on the end...)

Last weekend’s shows were fun. I wanted a shot at being the protagonist in both shows I was in, so I went out in the first scene both times. Unfortunately both times the protagonist instantly landed on someone else. I suspect that one key to becoming the protagonist is to make a big physical offer as soon as the first scene starts. Andy did that on Friday and Zack did that on Saturday and both pretty much instantly became the protagonist.

I’ve also noticed that both times in rehearsal that I’ve started a scene by scrubbing the floor, I instantly became the protagonist. I don’ t know if that’s further evidence of the “making a big physical offer makes you the protagonist” theory, or if there’s some “Cinderella complex” associated with scrubbing the floor that makes you the protagonist in that instance.

But Monday, I was talking to Susan, who had heard all about Friday’s show from Tara and Susan pointed out something that had never occurred to me. I have developed a rather specialized niche during long form of becoming the protagonist of the B plot. I’m not who the show’s about, but I’m frequently who the side plot is about.

On Friday I was a bee keeper/heroin dealer who kept coming up with ludicrous conspiracy theories as to why the bees were disappearing. Christian, playing another bee keeper, and Tim (as puppet Larry) playing a hick farmer, and I served as the “clowns” in a very Shakespearean-like plot for the show. It was great fun and I spent the entire show setting myself up for a joke that I was able to land the punch-line for right at the end. It was the longest I’ve ever knowingly set myself up for a joke. Odd, but very satisfying.

What was the joke? Well, you had to be there, but… basically I kept coming up with outlandish reasons the bees were disappearing. The real reason the bees were disappearing, as endowed early in the show by Amy, was that aliens were taking them back to their home-world where bees originated. So when my character found out aliens were taking the bees, he said “that’s the most ridiculous thing I ever heard.”

Here’s brief summaries of the shows:
Thursday: To Be or Not To Be
When Greg (Dave) moves out of his apartment to pursue his dreams of being an actor, he leaves his room-mate Billy (Zack as puppet Dungeon) behind. But a Kent State Shakespeare Festival production of Hamlet teaches Greg and Billy that there's more to life than video games and acting exercises.

Friday: To Bee or Not to Bee
A group of bee keepers, led by Kevin (Andy) go on a mission to discover why all the bees are mysteriously disappearing. Along the way Kevin meets Patricia (Tara as puppet Petal), a young aspiring bee keeping student, and they fall in love. But when Kevin finds out Patricia is really an alien being sent to collect all the bees to return to their home world, what will he choose? To bee or not to bee?

Saturday: Monster Steps
Eustace (Zack as puppet Dungeon) leaves home to use his geology degree in the mines. He falls in love with worker's rights activist Kelly (Amy) and has to come to grips with his own self image as he prepares to a Monster/Human relationship. Can they ever work? If you were at the show, you know.

Coming Together

Performing in Friday’s show was soooo much fun. Everything really came together that night mostly because the whole show was so character driven. We had just as much plot as we needed. The humor came naturally out of the characters interacting with one another. Everybody played a part and everyone in the show had their song.

Here are some disjointed highlights:
I say the strangest things when I’m choking – Zack
Did they have hospitals when you gave birth – me
No, Mom. He’s the best doctor here at Kaiser – Tara
I love you. But I need to go now – Andy
Everything Amy said.
Amber using finger puppets to be the sonogram images of Tara’s triplets.

And many more I’m sure I’m forgetting.

I also got to use Marcel all night. I love Marcel. He played Dr. Vagner. My own personal puppet highlight was Marcel taking his space-object stethoscope out of his ears. Marcel’s character was German. Amy’s was an overbearing Jewish mother. We had a great scene together. Oh! It was so much fun, and so organic and natural. The characters were just built to play off each other with Tara in the middle trying to hold it together.

Here’s a summary of Friday’s show:

And Babies Make Five
Jerry (Andy) and Ariel (Tara) find out their having triplets! Ariel’s terrified she’ll drive her children insane the way her mother drove her crazy. Jerry suddenly has to confront settling down. Except… Jerry gets called away for a 2 week cross country delivery with his best friend Verne (puppet Mel played by Zack) and Ariel’s mother (Amy) comes to visit while he’s gone. When Jerry runs into his ex-girlfriend Rita (puppet Evelyn played by Amber) at a strip club, he realizes he needs to be back home. After some near-death mother/daughter bonding, Arial and her Mom work out their own differences. In the end, everyone has a better idea what’s going on.

People Like to Make Puppets!

Opening weekend we had a matinee performance, and as an extra enticement to bring in audience, people who arrived early had the opportunity to make finger puppets. This proved so popular we’ve brought it back as a regular part of our Thursday night performances.

I find it amazing and amusing how much people enjoy making finger puppets! They get so into it. Gluing on eyes and crazy hair. And people have so much fun doing it. I get such a warm fuzzy from it, and it puts the audience in such a great mood for the show. We should do crafts before every show! They laugh, they get to know strangers making puppets next to them. I’d love to come up with a way to use them in the show, but people get very attached to their creations and I don’t know that they’d want to lend them to us for the show. We need to figure out a way for them to use them themselves from the audience.



Here’s what happened in last night’s show:

Overwhelmed
Everyone Dolores (Christian as puppet Shortcake) meets through Craigslist ends up being married. Then one day at a ballgame she meets a peanut salesman, Barry (Mandy as puppet Peanuts). He’s single, but he’s also a recovering smack addict who soon finds Dolores is his new addiction. Tempers flare and fists fly when Dolores’s married ex Kevin (Andy) wants back in her life. Who will Dolores choose? Well, let’s just say Dolores and Kevin both find happiness, just not with each other.

More Puppets!

Alas, I was not in any of last weekend's shows as I was out of town, but here are summaries of what did happen! (These are the same summaries you'll find in this week's email, if you're on our mailing list. Sorry I don't have anything new to post. Perhaps after reheasal tonigh.)

Thursday: On the Brink
Suzanne (Mandy-as-puppet-Petal) is a prison guard who is thinking of
quitting until handsome ace reporter Ron (Clay) gets assigned to do an
in-depth story about the prison and is granted access by his roommate John
(Zack-as-puppet-Larry). Meanwhile, Rocco the warden
(Christian-as-puppet-Hidalgo) is also interested in access ... to Suzanne.
When Suzanne yells "fire" at the Policeman's Ball in order to distract
Rocco, she winds up behind bars herself, and the only thing that saves her
from Rocco's indecent attentions is her former roommate Sandra (Tara), who
submits to Rocco's whims in Suzanne's behalf. Aided by iron-pumping,
rock-moving cellmate Stu (Christian-as-puppet-Tad), Suzanne and Ron expose
Rocco's machinations and save the day.


Friday: Here or There
Ethel (Tara-as-puppet-Dungeon) lives above a travel agency, but she's
never left St. Louis. Instead, she fills her life, and Mr. Wince
(Andy)'s travel agency, with all her homemade clothes. When
tempestuous fashion buyer Ramon Gutierrez (Andy) discovers Ethel's
talent, the jaded but uberfamous designer Mr. Richards (Tim)--inventor
of shoulder pads in the 80s!-- and his assistant
(Clay-as-puppet-Sidney) decide to produce her collections. After a
whirlwind tour of the world, Ethel and Mr. Richards make a connection.
When she decides that St. Louis is enough for her after all, Mr.
Richards decides to give up the world and go live with her. He even
tells her his deepest secret: his first name is Stan.

Saturday: Moving On
Sam (Christian) arrives at Middlebury Elementary, ready to start his
new job as a fifth-grade teacher. But he's got a dark side: he's in
the witness protection program, set to testify against mob boss
Luigi--his own father. Anxious to stay on the good side of the FBI
agents (Amy and Andy) protecting him, Sam's determined to keep a low
profile. But, his unorthodox teaching methods throw him unexpectedly
into the arms of his uptight colleague Angela (Mandy). And knowing
nothing about teaching, he manages to wrangle his sassy, chain-smoking
class of fifth-graders (Amy, Clay, Andy, Tim) into newfound
responsibility AND a win at the fifth-grade history fair. The
publicity brings the mob right down on him--but he chooses Angela and
his class, even over his own father.

Reviewed!

http://contracostatimes.com/entertainment/ci_5837114

PAT CRAIG: THEATER
The audience's input keeps 'Puppet' lively
By Pat Craig
CONTRA COSTA TIMES

Article Launched:05/07/2007 03:03:47 AM PDT

Improvisational theater is tightrope walking for those who prefer both feet on the ground. Add puppets and music, and you get a rodeo of wit, and the clever construct of "The Great Puppet Musical," a new play each time it hits the stage, by San Francisco's Un-scripted Theater Company.
The company, which has been performing since late 2002, boasts a cast of excellent improvisers who were inspired to bring songs and puppets into their glib little family. While musical parody is nothing new to improv, and while puppets, after "Sesame Street" and "Avenue Q," are nothing new to theater, the blending adds an exciting new mix to the improv arsenal.

Not only does it offer an unusual visual element, but it also gives the performers additional comedic possibilities. This production, directed by Mandy Khoshnevisan, who also performs with the troupe, begins like most improv comedy -- by asking audience members for some basic concepts for the show.

On Thursday's opening night, the audience-selected theme was procrastination, and an opening number that dealt with the various sorts of putting-it-off behavior mentioned by the audience. It then quickly evolved into a musical that might be called, "How to Fail at Business by Trying Too Hard," the tale of a young man who puts off asking for a raise and ultimately is fired through the double-dealing efforts of an overly ambitious co-worker.

To say any more about the opening night story would be silly, since the tale told will be different each night, depending on the suggestions of the audience, who happens to be in the cast (the company uses maybe a half-dozen of its 11-member troupe in each show), and how the creative winds happen to be blowing on a particular night.

For audiences, this is the ultimate theatrical experiment. The show is being made up as it goes along, so there is a chance that some of it will fall flat on its face, which appeals to some improv fans (with similar tastes to those who go to car races to see crashes). There will be bits that don't work in just about every performance, but most shows tend to be combinations of diamonds and dirt. The reward, for both the performers and the audience, happens when everything comes together in an energy storm of hilarity and produces something close to comic alchemy.

Since the performers all appear, from their program bios, to have considerable experience with the craft, chances are the scales will tip toward the good each night. That was certainly the case in Thursday's opener, particularly with the songs, which not only played wonderfully, but added to the story.

Most impressive, though, were the pacing and construction of the improvised play into a fully realized story. Not only did the show provide plenty of chuckles, it actually formed a plot, made logical progression and came to a satisfying conclusion -- quite a feat for something made up on the spot. This is bare-bones theater, with much of the visual detail left to the imagination; it's just people, puppets and a few chairs to represent the improvised plot.

Pat Craig is the Times theater critic. Reach him at 925-945-4736 or pcraig@cctimes.com.

THEATER REVIEW


WHAT: The Un-scripted Theater Company presents "The Great Puppet Musical," an improvisation

WHEN: Thursdays-Saturdays, through June 2

WHERE: S.F. Playhouse Second Stage, 533 Sutter St., S.F.

RUNNING TIME: 1 hour, 45 minutes

HOW MUCH: $15

CONTACT: www.un-scripted.com

Opening Weekend, Come & Gone

I have now performed in two shows. Man! Was it a lot of fun! Highlights included:

- Amber “killing” her puppet on Friday night by dropping it on the floor and leaving the stage.
- My puppet giving Amber’s puppet mouth to mouth.
- THE Santa Clara University
- Singing “There is no Santa Clara” when everyone expected me to sing “There is no Santa Clause”
- Amber “Don’t tell me you trusted him to hire the preacher!”
- Dave saying he’d raised my character from an egg.
- The slow motion home run trot.
- Reincorporating Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
- Knowing the second Dave brought me on stage that we’d time jumped to his wedding without him having to tell me.
- Dave pimping my character to have a complaint at the police department.
- Amy asking Tim’s puppet to use puppets in their therapy session.
- Hidalgo

Mostly I played two characters. I played Tim, a puppet, on Friday night. He was a young kid trying to get the attention of his single dad. Saturday I played Johnny, Thor’s somewhat dim-witted right-hand man. They were both loads of fun.

Here’s a brief summary of the two shows:
Friday: Promises, Promises
Tim (puppet performed by Alan) needs a new coach for his t-ball team. Tim’s father Vince (Dave) needs more time in the day to be a single parent. Debbie (puppet performed by Amy) needs to take her mind off her ex, Steve (Zack). Together they find not all promises are made to be broken.

Saturday: Never Enough
When Thor (puppet performed by Tim) decides to capitalize on global warming by hording bottled water, he soon finds himself in jail robbed of everything he held dear. Soon he discovers all he really wanted was the respect of his girlfriend Debbie (puppet performed by Amber) and the love of his long lost brother Hidalgo (puppet performed by Clay)

Putting it Off!

Opening night went swimingly! We had a packed house largely in thanks to regulars Joey and Ryan. Things went off without a hitch, for the most part. We didn't have time to hang the legs before the show, so the players didn't have wings to hide in while offstage. So the audience had a full view of the performers, even when they weren't on. I actually liked it a lot. Shows we're not hiding anything. They can see the performers aren't planning backstage during the show and they can see us react and enjoy the show. I liked it, personally.

Her's a summary of the the show!

Putting it Off!


Tim (Christian) never seems to be able to find the right time to ask his boss (puppet performed by Zack) for a raise. After 18 years at the company, no one appreciates his work and he’s stuck assisting Andy (puppet “Glover”, performed by Mandy), a once brilliant V.P. who, after a tragic boating accident in the Caribbean, has been left mentally challenged.

Steve (puppet “Larry” performed by Dave) convinces the boss to downsize to safe money, and soon Tim is out of a job. Not only that, but Steve starts sleeping with Tim’s ex-girlfriend Becky (Tara) using Tim’s own spare bedroom as their love-nest. And somehow Andy follows Tim home and stays; though, he has a bad habit of forgetting to wear pants.

At the prodding of his 4-star chef room-mate Mark (Clay), Tim works his way back into the company through the mailroom and soon uncovers Steve’s devious secret plan to sell the company to Chinese investors. Steve gets fired, loses Becky, and after a fist-fight with Tim, realizes that….

Well, let’s just say both Tim and Steve learned some sort of life lesson. Becky moved on to another man. Mark kept cooking, and Andy scratched his head and wondered where his pants were.

Time to Open!

We had our “last” rehearsal for the Great Puppet Musical Tuesday night. We’ll continue to have rehearsals throughout the run, but this was the last one before opening.

We ran “skeletons” of two shows at rehearsal. What does that mean? Well, we did a bare bones version of the first act making sure to include the three most important songs: Opening song, the protagonist song, and the point-of-view Act I closing song. The opening song sets the tone for the show and focuses on the central theme that we’ve in some way gotten from the audience. The protagonist song establishes how the protagonist feels about their life and may delve into what they want deep down. The point-of-view Act I closing song involves several characters, the protagonist being one of them, each singing their point-of-view of the events to that point in the story.

Then we talked through the second act and did a closing number, which hopefully is a reprise of the opening number. I say hopefully because it’s really hard to reprise an improvised song. But we do what we can.

Now you may be thinking… That’s cheating. They know what songs their going to sing! Well, we know what types of song we’re going to sing, but we don’t know the music they’ll be sung to, the words we’ll sing, who will be singing them, or what characters we will be playing. So you see, it’s mostly up in the air.

And in case you're wondering, how we tend to structure musicals at Un-Scripted owe's a lot to the work of Kat Koppett. Many members of Un-Scripted worked with her when she lived in San Francisco and was a member of BATS Improv. (And yes, she is related to the late Hall of Fame sportswriter Leonard Koppett.)

We have yet to run the entire show from start to finish in a rehearsal. In fact, we rarely ever do that. The first time we’ll try to do this for a full 2 hours will be tonight in front of a paying audience. It’ll be an adventure!

When I'm Performing!

The play schedule has been released for the Great Puppet Musical!

If you want to catch yours truely in action, here's when I'm playing:

Friday, 5/4
Saturday, 5/5 (MATINEEEEE! 2pm show!)
Friday, 5/18
Friday, 5/25
Saturday, 5/26
Friday, 6/1
Saturday, 6/2

And here's the complete (though somewhat subject to change) play schedule if you want to see who else is playing when:

Thursday, 5/3
Lights: Alan
Cast:
- Mandy
- Tara
- Dave
- Christian
- Zack
- Clay

Friday, 5/4
Lights: Christian
Cast:
- Amber
- Dave
- Alan
- Amy
- Zack
- Tim

Saturday, 5/5 (MATINEEEEE! 2pm show!)
Lights: Christian
Cast:
- Amber
- Dave
- Alan
- Amy
- Clay
- Tim

Thursday, 5/10
Lights: Dave
Cast:
- Mandy
- Tara
- Christian
- Zack
- Clay
- Tim

Friday, 5/11
Lights: Dave
Cast:
- Amber
- Tara
- Dave
- Clay
- Tim
- Andy

Saturday, 5/12
Lights: Tara
Cast:
- Mandy
- Christian
- Amy
- Clay
- Tim
- Andy

Thursday, 5/17
Lights: Alan
Cast:
- Amber
- Mandy
- Christian
- Dave
- Clay
- Andy

Friday, 5/18:
Lights: Dave
Cast:
- Amber
- Christian
- Alan
- Amy
- Zack
- Andy

Saturday, 5/19
Lights: Christian
Cast:
- Amber
- Tara
- Dave
- Zack
- Clay
- Andy

Thursday, 5/24
Notes: Tara
Lights: Alan
Cast:
- Mandy
- Christian
- Dave
- Amy
- Zack
- Tim

Friday, 5/25
Lights: Mandy
Cast:
- Tara
- Christian
- Alan
- Amy
- Tim
- Andy

Saturday, 5/26
Lights: Tara
Cast:
- Mandy
- Christian
- Alan
- Amy
- Zack
- Clay

Thursday, 5/31
Lights: Christian
Cast:
- Tara
- Dave
- Amy
- Zack
- Tim
- Andy

Friday, 6/1
Lights: Dave
Cast:
- Tara
- Christian
- Alan
- Amy
- Zack
- Andy

Saturday, 6/2
Lights: ?
Cast:
- Mandy
- Tara
- Dave
- Alan
- Clay
- Tim

Puppets and Long Form

So the last Three rehearsals… Eep, I know I’m behind… So the last three rehearsals for the Great Puppet Musical have focused mainly on long-form. Now “long-form” improvisation has many forms. In San Francisco, “long-form” means a full 2 hour show with one story arch, much like a play. Sure there may be sub-plots and side characters, but for the most part we’re following the emotional journey of one protagonist.

This is very different from many other “long-form” improv formats. A Harold, developed by the great Del Close, is called a “long-form”. Personally, I can’t stand Harolds and find them to be short-form improv masquerading as long-form in a way that isn’t particularly satisfying for me as a performer or as an audience member. But, there are those people out there who love Harolds. There are entire improv companies, successful improv companies such as Improv Olympic, essentially founded on the Harold as a format.

But I digress. The Great Puppet Musical is not a Harold. It’s a 2 hour, single story-arch, musical complete with singing and dancing. After the last few rehearsals, I think we as an ensemble are going to tell some kick ass stories.

We’ve had a tortured puppet painter who falls in love with the woman at the art store and has to battle his way out of his brother’s shadow.

We’ve had the wall-flower puppet at the office who finally breaks out of her shell.

And that was just last night. I can’t wait to get up in front of an audience and see what comes out!

Dance Puppet, Dance!

Last Thursday in rehearsal for the Great Puppet Musical (yes, I know I’m woefully late with this post, I’m very sorry), we worked on dancing.

We at The Un-Scripted Theater Company have, over the years of doing Let It Snow, developed a “dance vocabulary”. This is a series of basic steps (the jazz square, the Fred Astaire, the Charleston, the grapevine… to name a few). The idea being that, if everyone in the cast knows certain basic steps, you can break them out in the show, and people can follow. Audiences go nuts over any improvised group dance numbers that look halfway choreographed.

And actually, it’s better if they look halfway choreographed. Not that this is ever a danger, but if they look too polished, mistakes look like mistakes in the choreography. If it looks improvised, the audience forgives the mistakes and is awed by the successes.

Dancing as a puppet is a whole new challenge, however. The most interesting thing about dancing with puppets is that watching someone with a puppet dancing, whatever they’re doing with their legs becomes what the puppet’s doing with their legs even though the puppets don’t have legs. In other words, as an audience member watching a puppeteer dance with a puppet, it’s easy to suspend your disbelief and make the leap connecting the puppeteer’s legs with the puppet.

Am I explaining that right? I can’t tell if that’s clear, but come to the show and you’ll see what I mean.

The really hard part about dancing with puppets is the arm movements. We’re working the puppet’s arms with one hand. It’s really hard to maneuver independent arm movements with one hand. I suspect that we may find we get more impressive results when another puppeteer joins in to work the arms allowing for more independent movement.

You Bet Your Improvisor!

You Bet Your Improvisor closed in San Francisco a couple weeks ago, but we’ve extended the run for two weekends up in Napa.

Saturday Night I had the distinction (as far as I know) of becoming the only person other than Chris Sams to host that show. There was a show Friday night too, but they did that one without a host.

Man, it’s a lot of fun and really hard. Chris is amazing for having done it like 50 times or something ridiculous like that.

The great part about it, and this is something that Chris told me about beforehand, is that you really have three different scene partners as the host. You have the entire audience, the contestants, and the players. That’s a lot to work with.

It took me a little while to get comfortable filling Chris’s shoes, but I was having a lot of fun by the end. Except that my title didn’t match the contestant's! That’s so hard. I felt awful, even though everyone agreed, even the contestant, that my title was the “right” one. Oh, it’s rough though. Everyone wants them to win soooo badly.

I love hosting though. Playing with an entire audience is so much fun.

I’m doing it again this Saturday night. If you’re in Napa, check out Dreamweavers Theatre for details.

Puppets and Protagonists

That's right! Two rehearsals for the Great Puppet Musical in one week! We're crazy.



We did some long form starts in rehearsal last night. In my continuing struggle with the protagonist role, I managed to deflect being the protagonist in the first one, but take it in the second one.

In the first one, I was a human. I got a little in my head and deflected the protagonist role on to the puppet largely on purpose. Somehow I thought the puppet should be the protagonist. As Mandy pointed out later, in actuality, we may find it easier for a human to be the protagonist. With the exception of some of the more experienced puppeteers in the cast (Amber), we’re all better actors as human’s then puppets. You kind of need to be a good actor to be the protagonist.

So of course, I went right out in the next long form start and grabbed the protagonist role as a puppet. I was using Amber’s old Plumkin puppet. He’s very expressive, in a wide-eyed way. Mandy gave me the positive note afterwards that I have a way of using the entire puppet when the puppet speaks, instead of just the mouth. Yay me! Except now I need to forget that note because that was not something I was doing consciously. Otherwise the next time I pick up a puppet I’ll be unable to do anything but move the mouth.

The Problem With Puppets

Alan's adventures in Un-Scripted's The Great Puppet Musical continue...




The problem with puppets is that they’re too interesting. As Mandy said last night in rehearsal (and I’m paraphrasing badly) “the puppets haven’t become boring enough to be interesting again”.

What does that mean? As improvisors, we’re too excited to be puppets. This has made us all rather focused on ourselves and the fun things we want to do with the puppets, thus making us horrible improvisors.

This made for some painful moments in rehearsal last night, at least for me, but also led to one of my personal highlights from rehearsal last night. While watching from the sidelines a scene between a mess of puppets devolve into an ever downward spiral of confusing offers while each puppet fought for control of the scene and the validity of THEIR offers, I was able to come in (as a person, not a puppet) and tag the scene with a one-liner that suddenly made all the mess that had preceded it make sense. And it was a tag that would NOT have worked had I come in as a puppet.

I’m not one to toot my own horn, but it was a very satisfying moment. I hadn’t “tagged” a scene that well in years.

Then we arrived at the odd truth of the matter: The puppets need to learn how to improvise. I’m suddenly starting to understand how puppets become imbued with so much life of their own. Sometimes this has seemed odd to me, the way puppeteers will refer to puppets as separate entities when in truth the puppeteer is controlling the puppet. But the fact of the matter is: the puppet is a very separate thing. The puppet takes on a sub-identity within the puppeteer.

And our puppet selves need to learn how to improvise.

So we worked on some basic improv exercises. We played a raise-the-stakes exercise and then moved onto New Choice. Suddenly the puppets started being able to do somewhat passable scenes.

Then we played a game were in the improvisors (puppet and human) had to pause 10 seconds after speaking before someone else could speak. Eureka! We did an actual scene! Thus revealing another truth: Puppets are more interesting when they’re not talking. The have incredible emotive powers. Letting them slow down and emote is far more interesting to watch.

Puppets!

We had rehearsal on Wednesday night for the Puppet Musical. It’s so much fun! I can’t wait for this show.

We did a lot of “protagonist” work. At Un-Scripted we talk a lot about “protagonists”. Who’s the scene about? Who’s the story about? Especially in a 2-hour long form, we’ve found life is sooooo much easier of we establish a likable protagonist with a strong want/need in the first 2 scenes of the show.

I have become a master at NOT being the protagonist. I can pimp my fellow performers to be the protagonist with the greatest of ease, and I can deflect any attempts to make me the protagonist without even thinking about it. It’s actually a problem, because half the time I’m not even aware that I’m doing it.

I’m trying to change that. I’m trying to learn how to accept that protagonist role and how to grab it myself if I want it. I want to become more comfortable wearing that hat.

I suspect the reason I’m so good at deflecting it is because, in general, I don’t like being the center of attention. I realize that may sound ridiculous considering that I’m a performer and it doesn’t really make sense considering how much I like hosting and MCing shows. But there it is. Being the protagonist makes me uncomfortable.

I suspect that performing a puppet as the protagonist will be easier for me and help me get more used to the role. After all, as the puppet, it’s no longer me who’s the center of attention. It’s the puppet.

I can’t wait to try it out!