Creating a puppet show during a pandemic

I am | We are is an original piece of puppetry produced by Guildhall MA Collaborative Theatre Production & Design students in collaboration with Little Angel Theatre as one of their projects this term.

The show takes you to the tropical landscape of the rainforest, and was brought to life using mostly recycled and sustainable materials. We caught up with puppeteers Rebecca Walsh & Paris Linxuan Wu and composer & sound designer Victoria Hofflin to find out more about how the team created the project during lockdown.

Watch 'I am | We are'

What was your brief for the project, and what was your inspiration for I am | We are?

We were presented with a combined brief from Little Angel Theatre and also our programme leaders - to create a puppet show for young audiences that would tour to schools and communities across London.
We knew from the very beginning that we wanted to puppeteer animals. We spent a week researching and investigating different animals and habitats. Naturally we started to watch documentaries available including the BBC series Perfect Planet, which inspired us to address the way in which we as humans are impacting our planet and what we can do as individuals to inspire change. 

What were your roles on the project, and what did those roles involve?

Due to the small nature of our team, much of our roles overlap and we all do a bit of everything. 

Rebecca Walsh: I was one of three puppeteers, I managed and designed all marketing content and materials, and also helped coordinate with the schools for our virtual “tour”. 

Paris Linxuan Wu: I was the production manager who puppeteered one of the puppets. I was also in contact with various communities in the area to arrange performances. During the actual performance week, Victoria and I shared the responsibility of leading the majority of the live workshop. 

Victoria Hofflin: On this project I wrote and designed the score and sound design, as well as being a part of the editing team and assisting with the design and overall world. Together Paris and I lead the workshops with various schools and communities. 

How did you overcome the challenges of working remotely at home, separate from one another?

For this question, we would like to thank Teams, Facetime, Whatsapp, and Zoom for their ongoing support throughout our online journey of working together. 

Since we knew from the very beginning that we couldn’t be in the same room together when we filmed our performance, we took this challenge and looked at what interesting and clever shots we could do in our three individual worlds that would connect our story. One of the exciting things about puppetry is the surprises that come out of the sets, characters, and movements, so we knew that we had to take advantage of those possibilities to create our unique puppet project. 

We learnt last term with Remnant that being adaptable and flexible was the key to being able to keep the project moving and ultimately creating something we were proud of. Due to the fact that none of our three puppeteers could physically be together, we chose to design three different worlds and habitats, as a way of being as continuous and individual as possible. 

We also realised early on that working together online was the key to managing the isolation and our overall well-being. The majority of us live alone, so we made sure to divide our tasks in a way that avoided us working physically together, but still able to work online together. We coordinated hand-offs and the exchange of materials as big as puppets and as small as pouring PVA glue on street corners. We even utilized taxi services to ensure the safety of all our set pieces. It was fun to get creative in how to safely exchange things in a lockdown. 

Victoria: While creating and designing our world, we would sit online together, while working independently on our tasks. For example, I would work on notating the score while the design team Paola & Manuela were making puppets and bits of sets. It allowed us to share the design process and for the design and sound world to inform one another. It also helped manage the loneliness and was a great way to keep each other company.  

Paris: For my part, I definitely made a lot more phone calls and text messages to my cohort than the last project, just to keep the communication going, and to make sure we are on the same page on many decisions. For example, when I was practicing puppeteering in the set, I was constantly on Facetime with Manuela and Paola, who were the designers and lighting supervisor of the project, so I can make sure what I did looked nice on camera. Our group chat is also always busy with people constantly sharing new ideas, checking in, or discussing various tasks related to the project. I think in a way, being physically apart made us more aware of the importance of communication and regular check-ins. 

What made you decide to use mostly recycled and sustainable materials in the creation of the puppets and scenic elements?

Well, given the subject matter of our piece. It seemed appropriate. 

If we’re inspiring our audience to go green, shouldn’t we start first? 

The theatre industry is guilty of being one of the most unsustainable industries, and given the subject matter of our piece, we wanted to have as little negative environmental impact as possible. In the end, our design team utilised what materials they had at home, and as we learnt from Little Angel Theatre, anything can be a puppet or an element of a set. None of us threw any recycling out for six weeks, just in case we needed to create any extra elements. 

Paris, Rebecca – how did you create the scenes? What were some challenges you had to deal with as puppeteers on the project that you didn’t expect when you started out?

Our incredible design team, Paola Sanchez and Manuela Pecorari, were the ones to design and build the puppets and sets. They worked into their designs the ability for the sets to be transferable and to be easily assembled.  

Rebecca: As puppeteers, we had to utilize what we had in our homes to create our own “performance” spaces. Items such as desk lamps, baking paper, clothing pins, drying racks, and coat racks were used to help assemble our backdrops, our “stages”, and our performance lighting. 

One of the main challenges we faced was the goal for consistency in all our shots. Since we couldn’t be together, our filming process involved many check-ins and showcases to make sure what we were created would look seamless when edited together. Having three separate worlds definitely helped reduce this challenge, but we still wanted that consistency and throughline throughout our shots. Our designers were also really clever in using similar materials in each world that would connect them in style and aesthetic. 
Since I live alone, another challenge was trying to balance puppeteering all the elements when I had no extra hands to help out during particularly tricky transitions or shots. However, it just meant getting creative in my physicality. 

Paris: Before this project, I had no experience puppeteering a stick puppet, so lot of the challenges about puppeteering showed up as we got deeper into the project.

With all three puppeteers being alone while puppeteering, knowing how many hands we have, what kind of household items can assist us in puppeteering, and what we are capable of doing physically is very important. At one point, I had to ask my housemate to help me with some lighting because I really couldn’t bear an extra hand myself to complete the scene. 

Another challenge is probably something that we all had, which is to really study the movement of our animals and make sure we can portray the animal’s movement as accurately as possible. I puppeteered the ocelot which has many moving parts for me to control. It took me a whole week watching cat videos and studying the way they move. Eventually I learnt how to make my ocelot hop, walk, and jump, that looks natural on camera. 

Victoria – what was your process for creating the music and sound world?

I started in Sibelius writing and notating individual themes for each animal and element. I knew I wanted each world to tell a different story, but I also wanted to make sure it felt like one cohesive narrative. Once I had three themes, I created another theme for the space and planets, using this motif to bookend and link the habitats together. Once I had outlined the shape and rough timings for the piece, I started to orchestrate it all. I ended up having over 42 instruments and elements of sound design in total. Once I had orchestrated it, I moved my workspace over to Ableton, where I played each instrument line in individually using software midi instruments. 

As there wasn’t a possibility to record live instruments, I knew I was going to have to play each midi instrument in individually, in order to create that ‘live’ and ‘natural’ sound quality you get when you record live. Once I was happy with the musical score, I started to create my sound design world. I listened to recorded sounds of the Amazon rainforest, and collected samples from the BBC sound library and my own collection to create three distinct sound worlds. I spent two weeks putting the actual content together and then three days mixing and mastering it all together. It was useful that I was on the film editing team, as I was able to adapt and change things here and there as we were editing, when it became necessary. Overall, I was really happy with what I created and working symbiotically with the design team made the whole experience really positive and enjoyable!

What did you enjoy about collaborating with Little Angel Theatre?

We all came to the project with very little knowledge of puppetry, so entering this new territory was very exciting to us all. It was a great experience learning about how to make puppets and how to turn household items into a part of our set. 

I also enjoyed making a connection with schools and communities in the area who have collaborated with Little Angel Theatre in the past. Little Angel Theatre has lots of experience in delivering online performances during this pandemic. I enjoyed learning from them on how to organize an online event to ensure a positive audience experience. 

What were your highlights from the project?

The live workshop was a definite highlight for all of us! It was great to have the opportunity to work with kids from a diverse range of schools and communities from around the world. We were also able to have really heartwarming conversations with kids aged 4-10 about the environment and what we can do to have a more positive impact. 

It was inspiring really, these kids, all different ages and from different countries all had the same worries and concerns about the environment but were all conscious and willing to make a difference. Their energy was contagious, and it was really exciting to see how much they enjoyed what we had created together. It made us all really proud of what we had achieved and reminded us of the importance and the responsibility that comes with creating new pieces of theatre.

Victoria: My personal highlight was creating a piece that was so accessible to people of all ages and seeing how diverse and widespread our audience has been. I also just love having the opportunity to write music for something important like this!

Paris: My personal highlight was when I took out Oscar the ocelot at the end of a workshop to show him on the screen, all the kids began wowing and waving to the puppet. It was incredible to see how curious and excited all the children were, and receiving their most genuine and authentic feedback was very heartwarming to me. 

Rebecca: A personal highlight was seeing the positive reaction from our young viewers. Every workshop was such a heartwarming experience and it was amazing to see how excited they would get when talking about a positive action they’ll do from that point onwards.

What do you feel you’ve learnt from working on the project?

Communication is key. The more we talked to each other and the further we delved into our worlds, the better the piece became. Checking in and constantly supporting each other was also the key to working collaboratively and effectively managing our time and wellbeing. 

You can still make collaborative work even with limited resources or space, you just need to see it from a different angle or perspective to make it possible. Physical distance doesn't separate people in creating work together, you just have to approach it with an open mind and a willingness to adapt and be flexible. 
Learning to take physical space from the project when necessary. Separating work and your personal life is difficult when you are working in the same space all the time, so knowing when to take a step back and to just leave it for an evening, or day, or weekend, is crucial. 

Find out more about the MA Collaborative Theatre Production & Design. Applications for 2021 entry to the MA close on Wednesday 3 March.

'I am | We are' Production Team

Puppeteers

Laura Jukes
Rebecca Walsh
Paris Linxuan Wu

Composition & Sound Design:

Victoria Hofflin

Puppet & Set Design:

Manuela Pecorari
Paola Sanchez

Little Angel Theatre Mentors:

Alison Alexander
Oliver Hymans

Guildhall MA Collaborative Theatre Production & Design Tutors:

Rhian Jones
Susannah Henry

Laura Jukes, Rebecca Walsh and Paris Linxuan Wu

Victoria Hofflin, Manuela Pecorari and Paola Sanchez

LikeTweet