Theatre Design & Technology - Summer 2000 - 83

BOOK

Yi~~~e==v=ie::::-r.w~s_...::::i===..-:Sy=lv=i:::a_J._H_il_ly_ar_d_P_a_n_ne_I_1~~_
0rhlor

Rod Puppets and Table-Top Puppets:
a Handbook of Design and Technique
by Hansjurgen Fettig, English version by Rene Baker, Bicester,
Oxfordshire, UK: DaSilva Puppet Books, 1997, 353 pages, $45.00
(hardbound) .
Puppetry has long played an important part in American theatre, and
has even experienced several periods of rediscovery within the 20th
century, but in many ways its greatest renaissance has occurred
within the last few years. In ew York, The Henson Foundation's International Puppetry Festival once again was phenomenally successful in the fall of 1998, and as of this writing, the most sought-after
ticket on Broadway is for Julie Taymor's puppet and mask interpretation of The Lion King. Basil 1\vist's underwater abstract ballet, accompanying Berlioz' Symphonie Fantastique, has played in both
New York and San Francisco, while Peter Schumann's Bread and
Puppet Theatre and Ralph Lee's Mettawee Theatre Company perform
and tour new works to enthusiastic audiences. Most theme parks feature live puppet productions, and articulated parade figures were
highly evident worldwide during celebrations for the year 2000. Even
in the digital age, puppets and their more complex technological
cousins, animatronics, play key, even starring roles in blockbuster
motion pictures. Puppetry is hot.
Designers and directors have long integrated puppetry into their
productions, particularly in the children's theatre, of course, but in
other genres as well. Yet should a propmaster wish to obtain information on the construction of sophisticated puppets for use in the
theatre, the options are few. Many books exist that cover the basics of
sculpting and casting the puppet head, or building a simple marionette mechanism, but the vast majority of them are meant to provide
instruction for a child or an adult working with children.
Fettig's earlier work, Glove and Rod Puppets (adapted into English in 1970 by Susanne Forster and John Wright), was one of very
few books that went beyond the basics. Long ago having gone out of
print, it was one of the most sought after books in the field. I finally
found my copy after looking for almost twenty years, only to soon
discover (happily) that it had just been reprinted and expanded, integrating new material not previously available in English.
Europe, of course, has long respected and financially supported
puppetry to a degree unheard of here (though the changing economic climate, especially in Eastern and Central Europe, is making
that distinction less significant). Interestingly enough, though, Fettig
was an "amateur" in the finest sense of the world, one who dedicated
himself with devotion to an endeavor purely out of love. Freed from
financial considerations by his profession as an art teacher, Fettig
was able to establish a company of like-minded enthusiasts, forming
his company, The Cellar Woodlice. Here he experimented with both
content and form. Rod Puppets and Tabfe- Top PlIppets is essentially
a collection of his design and construction experiments, along with
those (always attributed, when possible) of his colleagues.
After an extensive introduction, the book is organized into ten
chapters, which consist of articles by several authors who address

various aspects of puppetry aesthetics (both
performance and designrelated). The first chapter
is autobiographical, describing Fettig's early
education and the experiences that led him to
his chosen avocation. This is quite informative, since he cites
influences such as the work of Dore, Daumier and Picasso, as well as
the eighteen months he spent as a WWII prisoner of war, working
with an impromptu theatre company in an American camp. Perhaps
it was there that he developed his ability to recycle materials as
varied as thread spools and plastic milk cartons for use in his
experiments. In the follOWing chapters, he documents his
experiments with found objects and various materials and
techniques. Some of the most interesting ones involve shapes turned
on a wood lathe, often sectioned and recombined, or subtly altered
with additions or subtractions to provide greater variation. Much of
the material found in these early chapters address the aesthetic
principles of puppet head design, something few other books
address at all.
As interesting as this is, the primary value of this book to most
working designers and craftspeople will lie in the chapters that document various complex mechanisms used mostly in rod puppets operated
from below. Here, Fettig draws both upon his own experiments and those
of others, some from sources never published in English, such as
Fedotov's SeC/'eti Teatra Kukul (a Russian book published in Germany
as Teclmik des PlIppentbeaters). Part of the delight of this book comes
from the author's memories of those from whom he learned, describing
the performances and techniques of performers and designers unknown
to me but who were clearly masters of their art. Fettig is candid about
both his successes and his failures, offering many variations of mechanisms which enable puppets to nod and turn their heads, bend their
arms and legs, twist naturally at the waist, open and close their eyes,
open and close their mouths, pick up various props, etc. These abilities
are all as important to the expressiveness of the puppet as the human
one, if not more so.
Later chapters continue in this vein, but focus more on the design
and construction of rod-puppet bodies, showing how both long rods
(with the operator well below the puppet, in the style of the Rhine valley)
and short rods can be used to create different types of mechanisms. Here
he relies extensively on plastic PVC material, in both its familiar tube
form and less familiar (in the states) sheet form, to form the "skeletons"
of his creations. He has developed a kind of ball-and-socket approach,
which requires heating, and molding of the material; this technique is
TZ>&T

SUM

MER

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Theatre Design & Technology - Summer 2000