Category Archives: Culture & Tourism

See Rough Magic Theatre’s Crown Jewels!

Posted on by Collette Knowles
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Hi folks, here’s the latest installment of stuff from our upcoming Glastonbury Festival Show “Clueless & Wuffles – The Case of the Missing Jewels!”

Obviously as the plot involves the theft of the Crown Jewels we needed something to represent the Crown Jewels.  I had a look at things that were available to buy but wasn’t impressed with the quality or price of anything I saw on a certain well known internet auction site.

So instead I scoured the local pound shops to see what they had in the way of sparkly plastic tat for girly little girls and also sparkly plastic tat for girly hen nights.  The magnificent effigies of the crown you see in the pictures are lovingly glue-gunned together from 3 headband/ tiaras, 12 tiara hair combs and a selection of delightfully gaudy and tacky party favour necklaces.  The orb is a mini disco mirror ball with various additions of beads/ribbons etc. that have been hoarded for many years in the hopes of them coming in useful.  I am a great hoarder of things which makes our house rather untidy, but you always find you need something just after you’ve decided to throw it out!

The sceptre is exactly as purchased though was described as a “fairy wand” I think.  I imagine the real Crown Jewels do not have tiny pictures of Disney characters painted on but who knows?

I am not a girly person hence my pouring scorn on pink glittery plasticky tat.  However, I have to confess that on bringing my sparkly haul back to the house I could not resist bedecking myself in sparkly plastic grandeur and indulging in some dancing about and giggling.  I would never have expected to feel such a sense of innocent delight at this girly dressing up ritual.  It would be amusing if the Queen did this occasionally with the real Crown Jewels but I suspect dressing up is too mundane a procedure for her.

The portrait of the Queen in the background of one of the pictures was drawn by me onto a flip-chart pad that is going to be one of the major props for the show.  I used a photo from the Queen’s Coronation day as the basis.

Have a lovely Easter everyone and I’ll be back with more news soon!

Skipton Puppet Festival 2013!

Posted on by Collette Knowles
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The weekend before last I had the lovely experience of attending Skipton Puppet Festival as a visitor rather than a performer.  As I had performed at the previous 2 Skipton Puppet Festivals Liz Lempen thought (quite rightly) that it was time to give some other people a go.

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Automaton of “Shakeys Grand Day Out” by Keith Newstead in Skipton Museum where the PUK AGM was held – Click to see “making of” Blog entries by Keith

DSC00335I also attended the Puppeteers UK AGM at the Town Hall on the Friday.  If you are not aware of this wonderful group, it is a collection of different puppetry groups such as BrUNIMA, B.P.M.T.G. Punch & Judy Fellowship etc. and has various useful benefits such as a directory of members and an extremely useful weekly newsletter which pools up to the minute puppetry info. in one place.  Members even flag up job opportunities to each other as well as being an opportunity to advertise performances that you are doing currently.  I have found it very useful indeed becoming a member and would recommend it to anyone.

I got the opportunity to finally meet the editor of the newsletter Peter Macdonald with whom I have had many email discussions over the 2 years I’ve been a member.  I also got to put a face to the name of Pauline Venables a lady from Doncaster who is very active in the toy theatre scene.

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Via Via

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Via Via

Tim and I saw two excellent shows “Via Via” by a Dutch gentleman and “Do Fish Drink Tea?” by Garlic Theatre.

“Via Via” was very excellent physical theatre and clowning combined with very skilful, intelligent and funny puppet manipulation, but not really one for the kids as a lot of the nuances would go over their heads.  Though the more obvious slapstick elements would obviously appeal to anyone.

"Do Fish Drink Tea?"

“Do Fish Drink Tea?”

"Do Fish Drink Tea?"

“Do Fish Drink Tea?”

“Do Fish Drink Tea?” was very professional and skilfully performed.  I particularly liked the live music and sound effects.  It did not have a strong narrative but was very surreal, fun and playful.

I returned on Saturday with some friends and family and made a point of seeing Ronnie Le Drew’s bag show.  I had missed this when he did it in the LSP tent 2 years ago and had been very disappointed.  I was not disappointed this year.  Among a host of charming puppet characters the highlight had to be seeing 2 of the original Sooty and Sweep puppets that Ronnie had inherited from Matthew Corbett.  Matthew was the host of the Sooty and Sweep show that I watched as a child.

Other highlights of the day included the Pulcinella show which was a slapstick masterpiece and it was fabulous to see the Italian roots of our British Punch & Judy tradition.  The Italian language was no barrier at all to understanding what was going on.

I also finally got to see “Plain Bob” by Noisy Oyster.  I have been at numerous puppet festivals where this show was on and didn’t have time to watch because I was performing!  It was absolutely charming and I still do not know how Bob managed to move on his own without the puppeteer laying a finger on him while he was sat on his little chair.  There was something extremely clever going on there all right!

Below are some videos of the festival that I have found made by Melvyn Rawlinson and Andrew of Puppet Vision fame.