Age of Covid-19 – Table of Contents
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P U P P E T R Y I N T E R N A T I O N A L PuPPETRy inTERnATionAl – EXTRA: PuPPETRy in ThE AgE of CoViD-19 – TAblE of ConTEnTs Jewell’s Marionnettes in the Pandemic of 1918-19 by Richard Bradshaw ......................... C-2 United Kingdon: Adjusting to COVID-19 by Cariad Astles ............................................... C-5 Iran: Crowning of Corona Virus by Salma Mohseni Ardehali ............................................. C-6 France: Extend a Hand by Nicolas Saelens ......................................................................... C-8 Indonesia: Investing in Community: Paper Moon Innovates by Claudia Orenstein ........... C-10 RésiliArt: Art and Culture in the Face of Crisis by Kristin Haverty and others .................. C-14 South Africa: Izandla Zobomi by Janni Younge .................................................................. C-23 India: A Roundtable Report by Ranjana Pandey ................................................................. C-24 Susan Linn’s Distance Ventriloquism Ventriloquism bygoes Felice Virtual Amato……………………………………… by Felice Amato .................................. C-26 Indian Puppeteers Persevere by Claudia Orenstein ............................................................. C-30 Post-Human Puppetry in the Time of Pandemic by Kelly I. Aliano .................................... C-33 Dear Readers, We include this special supplement on Puppetry in the Age of COVID-19 because it could neither be put off nor ignored. There isn’t a puppeteer anywhere in the world who is not affected by the pandemic in some way, either through the illness or death of loved ones, or by having their livelihood disappear overnight. We are a creative bunch, we movers of objects, we tellers of tales, we sculptors of simulacra. The world over, we puppet artists are finding ways to help ourselves, and to help the others of our tribe. The following are some stories from and about puppeteers, as well as the way UNIMA is bringing puppeteers from around the globe together to share and strategize through a series of online discussions called “RésiliArt.” Courage, friends. We will get through this, and I have no doubt we will learn more about ourselves and each other in the process. Gesundheit, Andrew (for Bonnie, John, Dassia, Donald, Vince, Lisa, Laurie and the board of UNIMA-USA) C-1 P U P P E T R Y I N T E R N A T I O N A L Jewell’s Marionettes in Australia and the “Spanish Flu” of 1918-19 a revised version of an article that appeared in Australian Puppeteer, Winter, 2002 by Richard Bradshaw figuREs fRom ThE Cook/mARks CollECTion, DonATED To noRThwEsT PuPPET CEnTER PhoTos: fRAnCisCo CARTER Her husband, Jesse Jewell, had worked but two passengers were seriously ill in Thomas’s company.1 According to and several had high temperatures, so the late John Phillips, the troupe had the ship was kept in quarantine for a sometimes been called Jewell-Holden, week. It left Sydney on Sunday night, RICHARD BRADSHAW has and it was Mae who was responsible 22 December, arriving in Melbourne and cinemas to be closed. Schools, The theatres remained shut for performed his shadow puppetry for the manipulation of the puppets. on Christmas Eve and the marionettes which were to have reopened after five weeks, and began to open on all over the world. In 2016 he She was known as Madame Jewell. began appearing in the pantomime on the summer holidays on the following 6 March. Goody Two Shoes, still was elected a Member of Honor The Jewells went from England Boxing Day. Monday, were now to remain closed. including Jewel’s Marionette Circus, of the Union International de la to live in the U.S.A in 1904, and Jewel’s Marionettes, were featured New South Wales and Victoria were reopened on Saturday, 8 March, with Marionnette, one of puppetry’s were based there until they stopped halfway through the first half of the separated from the rest of Australia as a “grand vice-regal performance.” highest recognitions. performing in 1935. Jewell’s panto in Circus Day in Toyland. They one quarantine area, so normal travel This was attended by the Governor- marionettes appeared in vaudeville, had an elaborate fit-up, with its own between Sydney and Melbourne was General, the Governor of Victoria, the museums and circus sideshows. audience of marionettes. Acts included possible. Passengers from Victoria to Lord Mayor of Melbourne and the Endnotes Madame Jewell was in charge of a performing elephant that carried its Tasmania had to spend seven days Chief Justice and their wives. 1 Thomas Holden had gone to the U.S.A. the troupe in Australia where they trainer off on its trunk, a lady taming in quarantine at their own expense The season was to have ended on as stage-manager with Bullock’s Royal were consistently advertised as three lions, wire-walkers, dancers, before embarking, and people needed “8-hour Day,” Monday, 7 April, so that Marionetes in 1873. Other members of “Jewel’s Marionette Circus,” rather Buffalo Bill on a bucking bronco, a permit to travel to South Australia. the show could open in Sydney on the that company were his sister Sarah Jane and her husband Henry James Middleton, than “Jewell’s.” They opened at and a lady dancing on the back of a By the time the epidemic ended in following Saturday, but once again the J.C.Williamson’s2 Her Majesty’s Theatre horse. There were also a couple of 1920, over 12,000 Australians had theatres in Sydney were closed. The in Melbourne on Boxing Day, 1918, in Highlanders who would “mysteriously died from it, out of a population of Melbourne season was extended by the pantomime Goody Two Shoes. stretch to a height of seven feet and about five-and-a-half million – a death another week and the panto moved The Great War had ended with with equal suddenness telescope to a rate of about 1 in 500. to the Theatre Royal in Adelaide Many of us have copies of books by the signing of the Armistice on 11 height of one foot.” The show ended On Thursday, 30 January, the instead for a two-week season the English puppeteer H.W.Whanslaw November, but an epidemic was with “a naval action.” Minister of Health received a beginning Easter Saturday, 19 April. It (1883-1965). I met him in London then spreading through the world, “Perhaps the Marionette Circus delegation of theatre and cinema then played in Ballarat (7 & 8 May), in 1964. In Everybody’s Marionette killing many thousands. It was called is almost too ingeniously absurd for owners and managers. The General Geelong (10 May) and left Melbourne Book, originally published in 1935, the “Spanish Flu,” but its origin the youngsters, and appeals more to Manager of J.C.Williamson’s spoke by special train for Sydney on 12 May. “Whanny,”as he was known to his is uncertain, with the first known the baldheads,” the Bulletin declared. for them, saying that 2200 people [They would have needed to change colleagues, revealed that the first case identified on a military base in “The eternal elephant and lion-taming earning a total of £7930 weekly were trains at the border because of the marionettes he saw were Jewell’s Kansas. In December, strict quarantine acts are about the most humorous, now out of work. That sum would railway gauge difference between the Marionettes. He was still at school was in force in the ports of Sydney but the lady on the bare-backed steed now be equivalent to more than two states.] when he saw them at the Victorian and Melbourne. is also capital farce.” Some of these AUS$4 million. Of these people, 1140 Goody Two Shoes finally opened Era Exhibition at Earl’s Court in 1897. The pantomime had opened puppets survive in the huge Alan Cook earning £5,300 weekly worked in in Sydney at Her Majesty’s Theatre Mae Jewell was born Mae in Melbourne a few days before collection now with the Northwest live theatres. In addition, the weekly (in Pitt Street) on 17 May, five weeks Holden, and was a member of a Christmas without the two specialty Puppet Center in Seattle. rentals of theatres totalled £2,300. late, and ran until 4 July. A two- famous English family of marionette acts from America, Jewel’s Marionette During the run there was a very That afternoon the Minister received week season began in His Majesty’s, presenters. Her father, John Holden, Circus and the Kenna Brothers, dramatic turn of events. The flu a delegation of equally concerned Brisbane, on 12 July and, after two had begun the tradition, and her acrobats. They had arrived from the epidemic had arrived and people were theatrical employees. days in Toowoomba the pantomime brothers John, James, Thomas and U.S.A. in the Makura in Sydney (via dying. On Tuesday, 28 January 1919, was to travel to New Zealand.3 sister Sarah Jane were all puppeteers. Auckland) on Friday, 13 December, the Government ordered all theatres C-2 C-3 P U P P E T R Y I N T E R N A T I O N A L Adjusting to Covid-19 in the UK by Cariad Astles A great deal of my work is dedicated to puppetry training and teaching and it soon became obvious that we were not going to be able to run training workshops in person, at least for several months. I work at two Universities: the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama and Exeter University, and teach puppetry to BA and MA students there. We hosted talks with professionals; developed making workshops that students could do with simple materials from their own homes; used the context of being “at home” for puppets to reflect on their micro-worlds.