PUPPET PLAYS.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XLIV, Issue 17, 27 April 1910, Page 48

PUPPET PLAYS.

s-'ine ling new in London—that is yet liundri'ds of years old in stagecraft—has : - i ji.ii u e l twice this week before < rm led audiences at t liiford's Inn ll.ill. t a puppet play. Menib rs of the llkley Vniversity Extension Centre—three women manipul:i* 4 the pnppels from behind the scenes, and tho t'r.inslation of tho play "The Prodigious and Lamentable Bistort' of J)r. .liihann s Fau t,” from tho original Corman, was also the work of tuo women. Mis- Dora Hussy and Miss - harlot to Burlier. At the perforinance tho dialogue was rea l as the marionettes were moved about, and the performance was made n.iieh more interesting, if pos-ible, by a preliminary- discourse on the Faust legend, tra-ing it front tho actual life of taat peculiar, a!nio-t Transatlantic iliar'at"! George I’au-t through the IGtli century to the stage and puppet playa

of the 17th, and their last performance in Goethe’s lifetime. So excellently was the play’ presented that it was as easy to follow as if the little dressed-up wooden dolls had been living men and women, and the whole was well described as "Philanthropy’’ (the play was in aid of the Potteries Fund and Leadless Glaze Exhibition) “combined with artistic instruction in delightful fashion.” In olden days—presumably about the 16th and 17th centuries—these little marionette plays were taken about from town to town, and the two elements absolutely indispensable from the audience’s point of view were humour and theology —both of those must be well to the fore from beginning to end of the performance. Crude stage managing was forgiven, but never lack of humour or theology’.