The Great Puppet Bollywood Extravaganza!

Bollywood!

The idea for a Bollywood show has been circulating in the group for a long time-perhaps,secretly, since its inception. Dave went to India, as it says in his bio, in 1997, and first encountered Bollywood there. Meanwhile, l went through my first Bollywood phase about two years ago, when my roommate was taking and then teaching Bollywood dance classes. We watched a slew of films, of course with great attention to the dancing. The dancing transferred to Un-Scripted, as Dave and I started insidiously working it into the group. We worked on Bollywood dancing at the retreat last year, and even taught it to some of the puppets.

Why Bollywood?

Imagine if Hollywood of the 1930s and '40s still existed ... if dapper stars still engaged in witty banter while dancing around impossibly large houses in amazing costumes ... if films were still musicals ... if casts included dancing girls,just because ... if every film worth its salt had a touch of melodrama ... Wait-you're in luck! Bollywood films are a fantastic alternate universe in which the beloved film style of the early 20th century meets the film style of today. If there's an American movie you like, chances are there's a Bollywood equivalent. There's the Bollywood Bill and Ted (Fan2sh), the Bollywood Die Hard (Mission: Kashmir), the Bollywood Singin' in the Rain (Om Shanti Om), and so forth. It's all the feelgood magic of classic Hollywood with all the bang of today's filmmaking. Kitsch and splendor, hip hop and high tea; all the tastes taste great together.

Why Puppets?

Puppets are amazing! I directed The Great Puppet Musical for Un-Scripted last year, and boy did we learn a lot. Puppets are fascinating; puppets are human; puppets have minds of their own. And, just having a puppet onstage is a whole lot of spectacle. Since we're on a small set,and can't really reproduce the huge,lavish settings featured in Bollywood films (except of course in our collective imaginations), we figured that puppets would add that automatic visual dash of spectacle and fantasy that you get from a Bollywood film. Having a fuzzy little guy for a friend, or a fanged monster for a father, lets you know that you're in an altered, enhanced reality. Anything could happen! You could marry a rich prince!You could fight off fifteen gun-toting guys with only a stick! You could shoot a gun by shooting it with another gun! You could burst into song and be transported to the Alps!

This show is quite a challenge-a fitting cap for our sixth season. We learn things from every show we do, and the more we can reincorporate them into future shows, the better. We're using the puppets from The Great Puppet Musical, the sets from Shakespeare: Un-Scripted, the song structures we learned from Let It Snow!, and the intangibles we learned from performing so many shows over the years (we recently celebrated our 300th performance). Thanks for coming tonight, and maybe all the other times you've been coming to see us.We can't do it without you! I hope you enjoy the show.

-Mandy Khoshnevisan