When a bug suddenly crawled across the floor, instead of reacting as humans to squish or shoo the bug, the students stayed in character, following the bug along on its journey. This spontaneity of movement was an unexpected surprise that
hooked the students.
Ayelet Golan performs Planet Egg by Zvi Sahar of Puppet Cinema. Photo by Simcha Barbiro continued from previous page
through a filter to get the best possible image.” Ayelet spoke of directing a site-specific opera performed in an auto repair shop. The main character managed the repair shop by day and performed illegal séances at night. “The space was huge; it could hold an audience of one thousand people. It had rooms inside of rooms. The opera singer couldn’t hear the orchestra to find her note.” But as the singer was raised up by the metal lift (a sort of animated object), the squeak of the lift played the same note that she needed! As Ayelet’s talk came to a close, the audience chatted excitedly. One patron said, “I had no idea that puppetry could be so many different things.”
As the semester ended, friends, family, and fellow students
Funeral of black balloons, a student exercise. Photo: Jamie Donmoyer
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gathered in UCF’s blackbox theater. “Our friends asked us, ‘what kind of puppets are you using?’” explained Kendall. “We said, ‘spoons, utensils,’ and they said, ‘no, what are the puppets?’ We just said, ‘you’ll see.’” Onstage were a few chairs and tables filled with all sorts of objects. Ayelet began the presentation by explaining that the students had chosen different exercises to develop into their pieces. As the lights came up, audiences were transported to a veterinarian’s office, a fancy restaurant, the Georgia mountains, and more, with just the simple transition of objects, actors, and sound. Each piece was presented in such a focused and thoughtful way that one could hardly believe that this was the students’ first foray into puppetry. It was the finale, however, that brought down the house. The entire class joined each other onstage, making music by using a series of objects. They worked in precise harmony until a red balloon appeared, with its own idea of rhythm and sound. The ensemble bullied the balloon mercilessly. A struggle occurred, and the audience watched in amused horror as it led to the balloon’s demise. A funeral was held, at which point all of the performers pulled out black balloons, making crying sounds with them. The audience could not stop laughing, and yet there was a sincerity of sorrow among the performers. Although Ayelet has returned to Israel, where she has worked for the past 10 years as the head of the junior high school theater department for the prestigious School of the Arts in Tel Aviv, she is remotely co-teaching a graduate directing class at UCF. William, Kendall, and Lauren plan to start a puppet club for students to continue to explore puppetry and object theater. “The practices of puppetry and object theater are so fascinating to us. We want to keep going and share the knowledge we’ve gained with others.”
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