Of Arms and Armor

Yes, Japanese armor can be duplicated on a small scale by black plastic canvas!

See:

And so easy to assemble that even a cat can do it:

The downside is…boy oh boy is it time consuming! What you are looking at is the result of two airplane trips of 3.5 hours each; six 40 minute long car trips; and seven DVDs of various TV shows from Netflix—and it’s still not done.

I suppose what you are looking at is the stark contrast of puppets done for fun and puppets done as a profession. A professional puppeteer would have discarded this idea because of the time involved…but me? Well, I was gonna watch the Netflix anyway. Also…if I didn’t have this to do, I would’ve just slept through the plane rides and car trips.

Frank and Wes

I was a little distressed last night for a couple of reasons. I have discovered a problem with glove puppets that I have never faced before. That would be prop items. You see, with string puppets you can count on one thing above all others—gravity works in your favor. Including but not limited to the fact that props and scenery have a floor to sit upon. Thus that lovely pumpkin carriage in Cinderella may fall over but there’s absolutely no chance of it dropping off the face of your little planet. In this way gravity works with you. Don’t get me wrong…in Marionettes there are ways gravity is not your friend…say perhaps if you should drop the controls for example.
So I suddenly was distressed by two realizations last night:
A. There is no floor—rolling stock is gonna have issues
B. If a puppet must walk through it…there can’t be any supports in the way. So forget that fence through the middle of the stage.
Both of the above I had already included in my script. I just couldn’t get passed it either. It was such a reverse idea…I tossed out my original stage design because it just couldn’t handle what I wanted to do. Distressing!
Last night, while Wes, Frank and I were playing games and polishing off the last of Frank’s Birthday cake I poured out my deep distress to them. Between the two of them and a sheet of paper, they solved all my problems. The design of the stage was just added to, not changed entirely and now I can see how to do things bottom up a little better. It was such a road block before. So I must say: Domo Arigato Gozaimashita to both Wes-kun and my husband Frank.

On Momotaro, Libraries, and RPGs

You know, it has always been true that librarians are puppeteers’ best friends. Not only do they open up their doors and hire you to come in and perform but they also seem to stock every puppet book ever written! So naturally, when I’m writing the script for Momotaro, I got online and ordered up a few versions of the fable.

I am surprised that in all three, the oni enter the picture only at the very end of the story. They are merely spoken of as particularly bad raiders and brutes…and in most cases, we don’t even hear about them until Momotaro announces that he’s off to fight them. It’s actually a bit like a roleplaying game:
GM: (reading the character sheet) So, you came from a peach, huh? I see you’ve min-maxed yourself for strength. Ok, I approve your character. One day you hear of terrible Oni monsters off on an island.
Player 1: “Mother, Father, I’m off to fight the oni!”
GM: Your parents tearfully see you off. Your mother gives you some food.
Player 1: I walk away from the village.
GM: You find a dog.
Player 1: “Hi Dog, you look like a good fighter. I’ll share my food with you if you’ll come on this adventure with me.”
Player 2: “I’d love to!”
GM: You 2 walk on. You find a Monkey.
Player 1: “Hi Monkey, you look like a good fighter. I’ll share my food with you if you’ll come on this adventure with me.”
Player 3: “I’d love to!”
GM: You 3 walk on. You find a bird.
Player 1: “Hi bird, you look like a good fighter. I’ll share my food with you if you’ll come on this adventure with me.”
Player 4: “I’d love to!”
GM: You 4 walk on and come to the sea shore. Roll for perception.
Player 1: Natural 20!
GM: You just happen to find a boat…you all get in and sail to Oni Island. They’re waiting for you. They all wield their iron clubs. Everyone roll initiative.
Sorta fits the formula, doesn’t it? Don’t worry…I think in my version the audience is gonna get to see an oni raid. Actions speak louder than words, and I’d much rather show the audience why it’s so important for this strong young man to rush off to fight the Oni, than have him just announce it one day like a bolt from the blue.
Plus I dreamed up a nifty joke for the Oni raid. Oh! I just gotta use it!