around the world with mr. punch

Happy 350th, Mr. Punch!

Wed, 9 May 2012 04:21:57 +0100

The Big Grin 350

Sat, 7 Apr 2012 20:52:58 +0100

Well, we got there. Mr. Punch will have a mega 350th birthday with all the trimmings.

You can follow all the news via www.thebiggrin350.com along with our facebook page and twitter feed @biggrin350

I'll be making no new posts on this site until further notice.

The legacy of The Big Grin will then see a new chapter in Mr. Punch's online presence.

But first, it's party time!

The Big Grin website launched

Tue, 25 Oct 2011 09:28:41 +0100

Two years in the planning and now down to three months of waiting. The Big Grin funding application to help celebrate Mr. Punch's 350th birthday in style is now in the hands of the funding body who'll make their ruling in January.

Meanwhile you can see the UK's plans at the new site (with a new logo) at www.thebiggrin350.com

Fingers crossed.

Puppet Cinema

Sat, 18 Jun 2011 16:44:19 +0100

Puppet Cinema
Have you ever wondered what puppets do on their day off? They go to the movies! Last month Punch and Judy and 120 other puppet residents of Minneapolis/St. Paul spent their leisure time at a special film festival created just for them. The Walker Art Center, in cooperation with Bedlam Theatre, designed this unique installation in The Walker's McGuire Theater as a wacky accompaniment to Improbable Theater UK's new production, The Devil and Mr. Punch.

Over 30 professional puppeteers from the Twin Cities area contributed puppets for the display. Local puppetmongers Alison Heimstead and John Bueche put together the installation with help from Duane Tougas, Julian McFaul, Mark Safford, and Chris Lutter. A special film montage was created by filmmaker Ragnar Freidank, an Improbable Theater collaborator.

Prof. Freshwater's Joey
Prof. Freshwater's Joey

And thus it was that an impressive group of holiday-deserving puppets enjoyed a wacky production of film scenes ranging from Gone With the Wind to Godzilla. They appeared to enjoy the production immensely (though some complained about the lack of popcorn.) Eat your heart out, Cannes!

Puppet Cinema
(Photos by Bruce Silcox)

The Devil and Mr. Punch

Sat, 18 Jun 2011 16:04:09 +0100

Improbable's Punch

At 6:01 PM on May 21, 2011, I was bit disappointed. The world had been scheduled to end at 6:00 pm local time, and I was quite looking forward to aerial acrobatics of the faithful being raptured skyward. Would have been a great show. But by about 8:30 pm, whilst sitting in a delighted audience on the stage of the Walker Art Center's McGuire Theater, I had to think that perhaps the Apocalypse had arrived after all. Before me blustered the nasty, nightmarish, prickly pyrotechnics of Hell. And Mr. Punch was in charge.

The Devil and Mr. Punch, a production of UK's Improbable Theatre, gleefully portrays a chapter in the lives of two Victorian era Music Hall proprietors, Messrs. Harvey and Hovey. With song and dance, a Punch Show, and such diverse variety acts as Orlando Furioso puppet battles and acrobatic piglets, we are invited to wallow deliciously in the pandemonious pace of the showman's life. Punch bits of business anchor Improbable's production, revealing tragicomic parallels between a puppet morality play and the deepest motives of slightly desperate men.

Set

The set of The Devil and Mr. Punch is a lovely, lush 19th century building facade resembling a hybrid of Victorian haunted house and "find the object" game. A metronome, baseball, and Victrola-like contraption all find roles in the course of the show. The puppets, based on the figures of 19th century New York Prof. Gus White, are beautifully rendered and expressive. Mr. Punch lacks an obvious hump, but otherwise elegantly embodies the style of the period.

Masterful puppet manipulation breathes life into every character and keeps the fast-paced show moving along. Two of the production's performers are British and have been with Improbable Theatre for many years. But the rest of the cast was assembled in the US and had only 8 days to rehearse together! Clearly these folks are all comfortably endowed with the skills necessary for effective puppetry. Two excellent singer/musicians, John Foti and Saskia Lane and, provide sparkly and sympathetic accompaniment.

Human acting is equally essential in this piece, and its two lead actors truly shine. Nick Haverson and Rob Thirtle are long-time Improbable members. Haverson delivers a standout performance as the fiery and complex Mr. Harvey. He propels the audience on a roller coaster ride through the showman's psyche, from hidden valleys of murderous impulse to stomach-fluttering peaks of comic banter. Rob Thirtle's long-suffering Mr. Hovey is the perfect, sombre counterpoint to the bombastic Mr. Harvey. Haverson gives voice to Mr. Punch, as well, while Jessica Scott provides puppet manipulation for Old Red Nose. Scott and Haverson animate Punch with all of the silliness and carefree abandon so essential to our favorite anti-hero's nature.

Julian Crouch, co-founder and co-artistic director of Improbable Theatre UK, is the lead designer and director of The Devil and Mr. Punch. I had the pleasure of conversing with Julian at length about Punch and Judy. It's clear he entered into this project with a true respect for the Punch tradition. He conducted quite a bit of research and unearthed some very interesting information about the history of Punch in both the UK and the United States. Attention to tradition informs his production of The Devil and Mr. Punch. The script borrows heavily from Collier/Cruikshank but never sinks into the rampant wordiness of that controversial document. Instead, the best use of its puns and plot are made. (Whatever your opinion about the Collier's script's authenticity, you have to admit there are some very funny lines in there.)

The Devil and Mr. Punch departs in a few details from the traditional techniques practiced by most Punch Profs. Punch's voice is not swazzled. But if it were, an audience would have difficulty understanding extended dialogue between Punch and his puppeteer. That dialogue is pivotal to insights at the heart of this show. Interestingly, swazzling had been considered. As I chatted with Nick Haverson after the performance, he produced a rather mangled swazzle from his pocket. Clearly it hadn't worked for him. But Haverson's vocal chords very effectively give voice to Punch with a rich, reedy timbre far superior to the flat falsetto usually employed by non-swazzlers.

I felt the absence of a slapstick a bit more keenly. I don't think one can really punctuate the action of a Punch show properly without it. Using a plain stick or bat instead of a slapstick is a bit like asking a period to impersonate an exclamation mark; it doesn't really convey the same percussive snap! The Devil and Mr. Punch is still a work in progress, and Julian told me that he might consider adding the slapstick.

But nit-picking Punch technique really is unimportant in a fair assessment of The Devil and Mr. Punch. Where the production really shines in its depiction of relationships: between Mr. Punch and his animator, between the two showmen, and in the warring qualities of comedy and pathos that lie in all human and puppet souls.

Most Punch and Judy-inspired theatre pieces make errors of balance; they lean too much into the light, or tumble too deeply into darkness. Punch is the comical embodiment of yin yang.

YinYang

The light and dark of his persona perpetually chase each other in a race that neither side ever wins. (I prefer to view the fish-to-fish yin yang symbol as Punch nose-to-Punch nose.) Within Mr. Punch, anarchy and murder are counterweighed by laughter and joy. But artists working outside of the core Punch tradition tend to either strip his character of its ominous underpinnings, removing essential tension and depth, or they portray a grossly malevolent Punch, robbing us of his comic egocentricity. Improbable Theatre makes neither mistake.

The relationship of Mr. Punch with his Prof, mirrored in the bond between Hovey and Harvey, resonated deeply with me. Trapped now in hell together with Mr. Punch, the showmen reminisce wistfully about the golden gigs of their careers. They come to realize how dependent they are upon each other. It's the bond between them � and with Mr. Punch � that gives their lives meaning.

Just now I am recovering from hand surgery made necessary by 24 years of Mr. Punch's abuse, and I had been toying with the idea of letting my Punch Show ride gracefully into the sunset. But Improbable's production held up a mirror and revealed the depths of my carnival soul. As I watched, I began to have my own internal dialogue with Old Red Nose: Oh, yes, you've hurt me, Mr. P, but we've had some glorious days together, eh. Remember the gig we did in a barn occupied by two huge Percheron horses, and how we got to chuckle about performing for some horses' patooties? And the time when Joey's finger broke off, flew into the audience, and he quipped, "Oh, I'm sorry! I didn't mean to give you the finger!"? Good times, good times.

If my battle-weary hand were never again up to the task of making Mr. Punch's world manifest, I would miss the particular gratification of audience laughter and admiration that only Punch can induce. Certainly I would. But that's not what frightens me. My deepest fear is simply this: Mr. Punch might leave me. I cannot imagine my world without him.

But that won't happen, will it, Mr. P? You're not quite done with me yet, eh, you silly old squasage? I've hoisted your weight and your moods for over two decades, and willingly. So, keep me in your footlights and never let me go.

And keep Improbable Theatre UK there, as well. They deserve your company.

George Speaight - Still Insightful

Tue, 9 Nov 2010 17:11:00 +0000

The late Punch scholar George Speaight is still arguing his case for Punch's origins — from beyond the grave! A Speaight essay entitled "Petrushka and Punch: National traditions and new developments" is available for free download on the web.

Thanks to Trev Hill for the link.

2012

Sun, 10 Oct 2010 00:12:10 +0100

An application for close on �250,000 was submitted last week to the UK's Heritage Lottery Fund on behalf of the various individuals and groups who came forward to be a part of The Big Grin project looking to celebrate a certain anniversary in 2012. These range from individual performers through to the Victoria & Albert Museum, a couple of universities and many local authorities. A decision will be handed down in January as to whether the application gets through to the next level (thus triggering the next stage of the application process). It's a very long haul and �like all funding applications �an optimistic shot in the dark.

Meanwhile, the recent award to The Fedora Group for its South Coast Punch & Judy project "Oh We Do Like To Be Beside The Seaside" - which includes the city of Brighton & Hove as chronicled elsewhere in this blog - has been accepted for the �Inspire Mark� which brands it within the Cultural Olympiad: the cultural arm of the London 2012 Olympics.

So Mr. Punch can say he's got his nose into the the Olympic cultural celebrations (and confounded some detractors) whatever the final Big Grin outcome. And if no money is forthcoming for his 350th birthday festivities he'll still have the biggest paupers' party he can throw in Covent Garden in May 2012. Fun is still free. And the whole world is welcome to come and join it. (Having done the various funding applications and nearly drowned in the paperwork, I can make this invitation without having to ask anyone else's permission!)

Red Tape, Red Stripes, Red Nose

Thu, 30 Sep 2010 19:46:59 +0100

The Red Tape Tsar watches a Health & Safety Officer inspect the sausage machine.

A recent item in the BBC's flagship political programme Newsnight brought the UK government's new 'Red Tape Tsar' face to face with Mr. Punch. The programme brought Lord Hodgson - the man charged with advising the Prime Minister on how to prune the excessive bureaucracy spawned by the previous government - to Hastings beach to see a version of my Mr. Punch's encounter with a Health & Safety Officer and to discuss red tape with the programme's roving journalist.

The picture above shows the bureaucracy-busting Lord watching Mr. Punch having a site inspection of his sausage machine. And we all know where that will lead.

His Lordship invited me to ring him afterwards at the Houses of Parliament to give him 'the view from the Prof' on red tape lunacy. Did I do so? You betcha!

The BBC site has a clip here

Victoria, Albert, George and Mr. Punch

Thu, 30 Sep 2010 19:18:43 +0100

The Victoria and Albert Museum recently acquired the George Speaight Archive in lieu of inheritance tax due on his estate. The museum's press release was timed in order to make an August Bank Holiday story and was duly picked up - with masses of colour images of Punch and Judy - by most UK newspapers and by TV. An edition of the BBC's big rating The One Show featured the story along with some good publicity for Old Red Nose and cameo appearances by Martin Reeve, Brian Davey and Jackie Codman.

You can find details of the acquisition - which will become available digitised online - here.

The Theatre Museum of the V&A now becomes the gold standard archive for all Punch and Judy studies and - you read it here first! - has enthusiastically agreed to partner the funding application being prepared on behalf of the 350 Committee (see earlier postings) in order to celebrate that special anniversary in 2012.

Punchy Monkey Business

Tue, 31 Aug 2010 19:29:09 +0100

Mr. Punch has infiltrated popular culture in many forms over the years and inspired some of the greatest comedic talents. The Marx Brothers certainly were well acquainted with Punch, as this excerpt from their film, "Monkey Business," illustrates:

I love the layers of homage in this routine! Vaudeville, which regurgitated the Marx Brothers whole, owed a huge debt to the comic traditions of Punch and Judy. Another layer: In my own Professor Freshwater's Punch and Judy Show, the Crocodile pretends to be several critters other than a Croc to fool Mr. Punch. At one point the clever reptile quacks. When Punch says "It's a duck!", Mr. Bottles (my bottler) quotes the famous Marx line "A duck? Why a duck!" Only the most devout Marxophiles in the audience ever get that joke!

Sean Keohane contributes additional information about this video: "The Punchman from "Monkey Business" (unseen, surreally, even in backstage shots), was Al Flosso... He was a friend of the Marx Brothers-- Bud Abbott had worked as his bottler at Coney Island-- and ran a magic shop in Manhattan that had once belonged to Houdini. Edgar Bergen was known to stop in, and so was my brother, when Al's son took over."