Masthead Logo The Iowa Review Volume 8 Article 32 Issue 2 Spring

1977 's Bread and Puppet Theater Barry Goldensohn

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Recommended Citation Goldensohn, Barry. "Peter Schumann's Bread and Puppet Theater." The Iowa Review 8.2 (1977): 71-82. Web. Available at: https://doi.org/10.17077/0021-065X.2206

This Contents is brought to you for free and open access by Iowa Research Online. It has been accepted for inclusion in The oI wa Review by an authorized administrator of Iowa Research Online. For more information, please contact [email protected]. With disgust and contempt, Knowing the blood which the poet said Flowed with the earthly rhythm of desire a ... Was really river of disease

no And the moon could longer Discover itself in the white flesh Because the body had gone Black in the crotch, And the mind itself a mere shadow of idea ...

He opened the book again and again, Contemptuous, wanting to tear out The pages, wanting to hold the print, to His voice, the ugly mirror, Until the lyric and the rot Became indistinguishable, And the singing and the dying Became the same breath, under which He wished the poet the same fate, The same miserable fate.

CRITICISM / BARRY GOLDENSOHN

Peter Schumann's Bread and Puppet Theater

was The Bread and Puppet Theater deeply involved with the civil rights is and anti-war protest movements and marked by their political moralism concern in two important respects: its with domestic issues, the home This is front, and its primitivism of technique and morality. primitivism are very clear in one of their earliest pieces, The King Story. You seated a which is on either side. A before large red cloth supported by poles head with a crown rises from behind and small, roughly modeled puppet a a announces that he is the King of country threatened by Dragon. He a does not know what to do. A White Knight in horned helmet, and with to an enormous fist and sword offers kill the Dragon. The King asks his all the The Advisers and People and they counsel against using Knight. 71

University of Iowa is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve, and extend access to The Iowa Review ® www.jstor.org a King decides to, in spite of them, and in slow dream-like sequence the Knight kills the Dragon, and then the King, Advisers, and People in order. As the Knight stands alone, seemingly triumphant, Death emerges from screen in a a behind the mask that is half skull, half helmet, with body of in a rags. He wrestles the Knight slow dance and finally kills him. In this drastically simple moral and political context, Uncle Sam is transformed an enormous a a into Uncle Fatso, puppet with bloated face and single fist carries a a that cigar like bomb, the emblem of greed and ruthless power. these concerns a Underlying moral and political is religious vision that as its main resurrection are chooses symbols and redemption. These made not Man impersonal and public, emblems of personal salvation. The Dead is an a a Rises early example of this theme. In darkened loft, small, dim spot before a screen. An of light appears gray painted fabric attendant, barely visible in black robes, kneels at the side. A tall white puppet, the Woman, enters slowly circles the stage and the light. The attendant whispers a a to through megaphone, and rings bell distinguish the "speakers."

WHERE ARE YOU GOING? (Bell) IAM GOING TO THE RIVER. (Bell) WHY ARE YOU GOING? (Bell ) THE RIVER IS COLD. (Bell) WHERE IS THE RIVER? (Bell) THE RIVER IS FAR AWAY.

woman The attendant breathes heavily into the megaphone while the walks around the circle of light. and abstracted in With these few beginning words and actions, stylized a manner, we have been carried into world of profound inwardness. The power and the suddenness of the artifice?disconnected speakers engaging an the absence of and the in interior dialogue, oversized puppets, color, of the the action in a dream physical helplessness puppet figures?place realm that has many features of the inner lives of children, another aspect one that is a clue to the dramatic force of the Bread of primitivism, and the resurrection of the dead man as a and Puppet. The primitive morality, in the reward for the devotion of the woman, is keeping with technique. Woman this is not and Despite the inwardness, the of play individualized, work is still on the nature of the re the emphasis throughout the public for ligious issues, the implications public morality. use a and an in The of Bread is part of the public ritual of communion You are at an Easter have been tegral part of the theater. sitting Play, you enormous a witness to the Passion and the puppets which grew for the event in a before the Cross. The have great lie collapsed heap 72 crawled out, shrunken after the event to their normal size. They pass through the audience handing out chunks of bread. It is not the usual mush a not but dark, heavy bread, made of hand ground rye, flour, and it in a requires strong teeth. You sit there communal ritual tearing at it one murderously. Is there only myth and ritual? The who hands me the bread is a friend. I is a nice whisper: "Mayra, what Jewish girl like you doing here?" are "What you doing here?" am From what I defending myself with bad tasting jokes? This event is different the at to quite from audience role Riverside Church, listening the B Minor or at we are Mass, hearing vespers the Camaldoli Hermitage: a sharing chaw of the seasonal god. In this theater the bread is a direct assault on aesthetic distance. as an In the setting of the Easter Play, bread is offered echo of the Eucharist and one is thrust into the role of the surprised communicant, but in its is more The is an os other pieces function modest. bread offering, it an tentatiously so, and therefore has unavoidable ceremonial flavor. is is Something shared, and the audience jarred out of passivity by the act a of eating together. Schumann intends the bread to be reminder that you come to the theater not just for entertainment, which is for the skin, but also for vital sustenance, which is for the stomach. That he should assign a this meaning reveals the habits of mind of confirmed allegorist, since it is, after all, gratuitous. Since he leaves out sustenance for the head and a an heart, it also suggests that he is primitive and anti-sentimentalist. are all created like in The puppets by Schumann, almost everything else over the theater. He makes them of celastic clay molds, and they vary in size from six inches to over 20 feet. The torso and limbs are cloth, and the expressiveness of the puppets is in the molded heads and hands. Schumann an are says that "Puppet theater is extension of sculpture," and his masks means. use the They the past boldly, and suggest African, pre-Columbian and Asiatic masks, Easter Island Heads, Chinese Temple sculpture, Lehm are bruck, Grosz; the dragons mostly Oriental, but the most wonderful set seem of monsters, large yellow heads with small monsters in their mouths, right out of Bosch. most The puppets create the first and striking impression of this theater, the miraculous sense of the static mask in motion, where the few words come inwardness of a through with the possession by great force?through inner movement the face of the sleeper into the of the dream. But Schu are mann's puppets quite unlike the masks of Attic drama. The voice that is not the are. One rings through them individual: only masks responds to to a since are the puppet, not person revealed through words, the words the but a narrator off to the side. seldom spoken by puppets, by 73 move a The puppets with dream-like Tightness that is adapted to their ones move size. The large slowly, occasionally breaking the pace with are not startling and often terrifying suddenness. We dealing with pompous a sense solemnity, but with of motion that the subconscious recognizes. to can Visually it is similar film, which condense time and action, alternate scenes, and shift focus with the subjective freedom of the dream.1 (Think of scenes us how chase let experience simultaneously the desperate scramble of flight and implacable pursuit. ) Likewise, the puppets move with a sense not of but of those distortions to an sense unreality proper inward of reality, for their size and motion have the air of dream. Thus this theater can deal utterly unselfconsciously with the fabulous:

THERE ISA DEAD MAN LYING IN THE RIVER. (Bell) WHAT WILL WE DO WITH THE DEAD MAN? (Bell) IWILL TIE THE MAN TO THE BACK OF THE RIVER AND TAKE HIM TO MY HOUSE. (Bell) (From The Dead Man Rises)

seems more In this context nothing natural than the resurrection that fol to a lows. In Ordet, Carl Dreyer tries force resurrection out of the fabulous into the we and casual world of plots and motives where explain magic as a a away violation of confidence, sleight of hand, and whatever power it on has in Ordet depends entirely its outrageousness, whereas the power of on our The Dead Man Rises depends initial acceptance of the moony world where resurrection is normal. The normalcy of the miraculous indi cates we are a that dealing with primitive system of conventions similar to those of folk tales, and the preconceptual thought processes of childhood, of our earliest attempts to understand the world. The corre basic elements of the medium of allegorical puppet theater to spond closely Piaget's description of the patterns of thought in childhood. For is nature example, allegorical causation like the post hoc of syncretic its on sense thought. Psychomachia depends for persuasiveness the early of imminent use justice. Schumann's of primitive expressive sounds (twitter has emotive ar ing, moaning, etc.) the weight of pre-verbal struggles for ticulation the seems and, similarly, dissociation of speaker and figure in to an itself be emblem of the separation of the child from the verbal world of The adults. very enterprise of allegorizing with puppets is rooted in ani mism and are concretizing, both of which basic modes of thought of child hood. This is not to say that it is a theater for children, but rather that the medium has its roots in the inner lives we carry with us from childhood: 74 structure com the of primitive cognitive styles; explosive psychic material posed of fantasies of power and helplessness, of incomprehensible forces, of magical fulfillment of wishes; of human animals and animal humans; of sense giants and dolls; and above all the of disparity between the puppet and its human role. One is seized by one's childhood. This is apparent in the way Schumann alternates simple moral absolutism with perceptual uses a ambiguity, satiric ingenues with child's vision of moral issues, and and characterizes stylized exaggerated gestures, and in general by the free dom enter with which the mysterious and playful this world. The first time I saw the Bread and Puppet in in the mid-sixties, I felt that I was in the presence of remarkable artistic power, and it has taken me years to to this an begin understand kind of fascination. I found myself resisting use reasons: understanding of the of the materials of childhood for two first, it seems to minimize the seriousness of the theater, which is vulner able to use any association with childhood merely because the of puppets suggests that it is entertainment for children; and second, the process of seems to one out maturity put acutely of touch with childhood. The theatrical means that Schumann uses to deal with this material of is It is a theater childhood pre-dramatic. of pageants, tableaux, and proces sions or art where sculpture walks, parades, dances. The of drama begins with whereas Schumann for a where some is texts, "pushes place language ... we we achieved find from language what really want."2 He works with stylized expressive gestures from which language is very remote but which, never unlike mime, seek to substitute themselves for languages. As he works, words are with are of "achieved" great difficulty, and usually great simplic As the its to ity. pieces evolve, company struggles through bafflement pre sent the out. actions that Schumann lays After late-night sessions with friends, full of questions, criticism, exhortation, home brew, and strong cof a or fee, few hand-painted signs words may appear in the next rehearsal as the work seems to enter to takes shape. Language organize and clarify work that is initially conceived visually. are a There few unusual works that begin with texts. The Birdcatcher in is from a in the Noh with Hell adapted Kyogin cycle, additions by Nixon as and Homer. What Schumann refers to the "religious sarcasm" of the Kyogin (which deals with a pardon for the Birdcatcher by the King of Hell is for his very un-Buddhist occupation) here applied to Nixon's treatment a text of Calley. Jephte provides setting for the biblical and music of Caris same simi's Oratorio, and Gray Lady Cantata #5 does the for Tallis' Lam Meine entations of Jeremiah and Bach's Jesu Freude. They present pag eants the texts and are translated that derive from characteristically into with its Schumann's Christian Humanism,3 pantheon of White Knights on for love of (who slay dragons deftly, sadly, stilts, us), Mother-Christs 75 or (who suffer and sacrifice for us), the comic-irreverant-sarcastic figure of the Gentleman Angel (out of the world of sentimental melodramas like In these to Camille ). Schumann's words, pieces attempt provide "a context a out and setting for musical works taken of their historical setting." (Con versation, November 1974 ). are means Sculpture and dance the of providing these settings, and are re words only marginal. The phrases for describing movements in was a in hearsal ( I Gray Lady Cantata #5 at in the win ter are a or of 1974) consistently "that makes beautiful sculpture" "that a never six makes beautiful dance."4 I once, in years of friendly association as with the group, heard the phrase "that is very dramatic," though the can mean or word engrossing expressive, this theater is.full of "dramatic" movements. gestures and ( Some of the "what does it mean" puzzlement of stems we naive viewers from the fact that ask that question about the verbal arts in a very different way than about music or dance, and it seems no matter on that how few words there are, people insist "reading" theater. ) In the summer of 1974, when Schumann decided to leave Goddard and free himself of the burden of a communal company, he set up a weekend as a called the Domestic Resurrection Fair and Circus both retrospective and as the occasion for the creation of a massive work, the Circus itself. were in Man Many old pieces shown the afternoons: The Dead Rises, to Hallelujah, Mississippi, A Man Says Goodbye His Mother, King Story, Theater of Uncle Fatso, Life and Death of Prisonman. The Circus itself contained parts of earlier circuses, notably the central parricide of Uranus, here appropriately enough the keynote of domestic insurrection?a comic a version of the archaic revolution. This insurrection is resurrection, primal validation of life by Love, the conquest of death, the circus, the big show. Where the structure of The Dead Man Rises (and other short pieces) is based on concentration and exclusion, the Circus is expansive and inclu sive: as Schumann says (in conversation, November 1974), "The circus sense. own doesn't make It is the opposite?show-offy, and it makes its rules. It is more amateurish, a collection." This is not to say that the work is without structure, but rather that it is episodic, its frame is enormous, movements is The the range of and type of puppets broad. large puppets move among masked and robed puppeteers, small puppets, costumed clowns, and tumblers. was an evan The title has been used for two previous pieces. The first circus in the summer of 1970 when the first moved to God gelical group use dard. It involved the first and only of audience participation by the theater. At the conclusion of the Circus an ark was formed around the audi storm ence, and they walked around the meadow chanting "The is here," seems between the ropes and banners. In retrospect this gesture dated, and 76 in so at time. I into to a fact seemed the moved the ark guide blind friend, in I not but the words stuck my throat painfully. could chant and merely in at felt awkward another refuge of the self-elect and burned the willing ness of my friends to be so. on was A street theater piece done inWashington April 24,1971, called The was Domestic Resurrection of King Richard the Last. A section of this piece called "Domestic Insurrection," and the verbal echo suggests the basic re resurrec ligious role of protest in Schumann's work, where the Passion and tion are a resur the culmination of determined and loving insurrection. The rection is its se domestic because moral urgency is If-transforming and aimed at internal political and social reform. To direct it at others would be ag is gression, political aggression. It domestic also because the chief images are of evil authority drawn from the family: Uncle Fatso, and Uranus the are Father. The images of peace and salvation the sorrowing mother and the the son. sacrifice of The basic "political" process suggested throughout is transformation in the name of love. is a The general pattern of the 1974 Domestic Resurrection Circus that of dance of life. It begins with birth, the birth of "the people" and of the a on con Circus Director, which is followed by circus with life show, and over is en cluded by the triumph death. The beginning solemn, with the an enormous trance of the God mask from the Easter Show, face supported on poles, that is sorrowful and transcendental and vaguely Asian. "The peo are out a ple" born by being hauled from under tarp by the Devil and his Helpers. They emerge with signs that read War and Peace, Law and Order, Rags and Riches, Guns and Butter, Day and Night, Sun and Rain. The po are as set is larities all ridiculed with slapstick each emerges. The playing so broad that it crowds attention away from the Devil's Helpers and the on are to a Gray Lady the sidelines who intended provide framework of remain a suffering and regeneration, but who kind of passive iconography alongside the fun. a This sequence is followed by dance of giant puppets, Uranus and are seem a Mother Earth. They about 20 feet high, grotesquely ugly, and out com nightmare of drunken parents careening of control. Mother Earth a a a plains of feeling ill after short waltz, and doctor drives up, climbs ladder to treat her and delivers her of Zeus-the-Circus-Director, who moves over the ladder to his father, knocks off his head, and completes the skip rope version of the Theogony. The cheerful parricide then proceeds to we can conduct the circus acts that follow. Daddy is dead and all have so we fun, have jugglers who drop everything, tumblers who fall, weight lifters who die trying (Hubert Heaver), magic acts, dancing bears (Ethyl a on and Butane), with group of Two Penny Circus clowns who egg the a is in contrast to audience with polished style that sharp the ineptitude of 77 the circus acts that are all show and bluster. In this parody primal revolu life new a tion, simply bursts forth and the Daddy remains child. a After the Circus proper retreats, the finale begins, convoluted alle a stations gorical dance of life where the figures go through series of that on suggest growth, initiation, taking the values of civilization, death, and some in en kind of resurrection. Each puppeteer, the role of "the people" ters a set in a through door up the middle of the field, and goes through a a series of stations that signify the process of complete life. Each is given a to at a star face mask, climbs ladder look (which dangles from the end a at an to a of telescope), works ironing board, pays homage little house a a stone on with family of tiny puppets by placing it (a funeral gesture?), a visits the Gentleman Angel who shows him his face in mirror, gets his Dance of Death costume, and disappears through the door he entered. The is none death dance peaceful, with of the expressionistic exaggeration of the medieval form that celebrates the triumph of death. When the last pup peteer is through Death's door they all knock it down, and carry off, stand on a a ing the door, figure wearing robe bearing the words "All People." is to a tune see This done wildly rollicking called Charlotte's Wag ( Appen is music over dix II ) that the appropriate for this easy triumph Death. The some a order born from such transcendental mayhem is clearly notion of a human community, and not pious mystagogy. The Circus is an elaborate of life with a nod to a celebration death and the evil, divine low comedy that in "a displays, Kafka's phrase, great careless prodigality."

Bread Alone or The Economic Base of the Theater one some resources If begins with notion of the artist working out of the of the self, then collaborative art, having to work with and around the needs to review most of others, having please politicians, decency boards, and mass con tyrannically the paying audience, involves unthinkable loss of Peter comes to trol of the artistic product. But Schumann theater via sculp ture is now and his Bread and Puppet Theater beginning the fourth phase to art. of his attempt control the economic necessities that shape his For a summer eight years, from the beginning in 1961 to late 1969 (with of com in in the ran munal living Maine 1968), theater with temporary volunteer a crew help for performances. Schumann says, "In N.Y. I had scattered who came to rehearsals and then disbanded again. Basically, I worked solo with a to summer help."5 For short period, from the winter of 1969 the of 1970 a there was group of 11 salaried puppeteers (at $35 per week), which, a severe despite the ludicrousness of the wage, posed financial demand. In the summer of 1970 Schumann moved to Cate Farm at Goddard Col a a in lege, and part of the company opened free theater Coney Island. The ran a on a Coney Island group for about year the money from European 78 tour a in 1969, and for another year on grant from the New York Council on the with some from Nathan's Inc. Arts, help Famous, Schumann has always to reasons: tried operate without grant money for two he rejects the ab of for he never surdity receiving grant money protest, and budgets shows beforehand. He makes some money and then builds a show with what is insists it available?he leaves him freer to experiment. (A member of the company applied for the Coney Island grant and Schumann says he must have signed the application himself but he doesn't remember it. It was sure an ly aberration.) For its first year Schumann kept control of the Coney Island venture: at Farm and to shows would be developed Cate moved down the city. to Gradually this control shifted the New York group itself, which folded at In a the end of the second year. , Goddard provided large house, a a care barn for theater and workshop, and took of the remodelling and utilities. Schumann refused any further financial support from Goddard: he not want to to did increase his responsibilities the college by joining the faculty. He simply worked with the few committed students who made the Bread and Puppet the major part of their curriculum. tour in an In the middle of the European the winter of 1973 Schumann he disband nounced that would the company the following summer, be cause to the communal company, too, had begun impose its financial neces sities was into and shoving him the pattern of the professional theater was world which he trying to avoid.

one I don't like the general situation of theater that gets oneself into one a . . . re when becomes professional recognised theater and then . . . sponds to the channels which respond to that that ask for that type we of theater. In other words, when go to perform both in this country in we to and Europe, would very much like perform for people cheaply, in our in . . . we places rather than the halls of fame of theater but in a ... end up playing lot of professional places for bored high-ticket we we people. A lot of things happen that don't agree with, but do it our because this is contact. One gets involved in this and loses control creation of that where one as of the place performs. Theater production we is one creates as understand it, that that place oneself. You don't sume one see is want to that because pays $3 what they theater. You be a create . . . one able to create surrounding that you for them not that is not are an is "just there." And that possible when you part of organi are zation travelling and performing wherever you invited.6

a a on as success The search for model of poor theater goes in the previous its In the case forms has brought deprivations. of the Bread and Puppet, 79 the model is one of the poor theater that allows uncompromising control by Schumann of the conditions, in fact the entire ambience, of his art. Al a a though communal living style might have created the conditions for profound collaboration, it has in fact created the reverse, the conditions for a artist to a a solitary shape company that performed his work for while with the fewest concessions to to possible financial need, that is, popular success and the tastes of the theater circuit. Stefan Brecht succeeded in upsetting the members of the company with a credit on The the he program Cry of People for Meat that composed for was his TDR article, not because it untrue but because it violated the gen eral decorum of modesty and anonymity. The credit reads:

Conceived, produced, directed and narrated by Peter Schumann performed by his Bread and Puppet Theater. Masks, costumes, lighting and music by Peter Schumann, with a much help and little inspiration from the company.

This, in fact, allocates the credits with precision. It is his Bread and Puppet a man Theater. This is worthy of mention because Schumann is modest and not at His name does appear for bows the end of performances. rarely ap pears on program credits, which seldom do more than give the name of the company. I do not wish to overstate this issue. Schumann controls as most directors do?a will a a certain or introduce a varia puppeteer perform gesture way or tion and Schumann will accept reject it. It is, of course, within the frame work of his scenarios and very detailed instructions. are There other aspects of this theater that both keep down expenses and are allow his control. The decor and music distinctively homemade, and the are masks, of course, Schumann's sculpture. That he has described theater as an extension of sculpture suggests the degree to which the model of the autonomous and individual artist still motivates him. And this is a basic as denial of the form of the theater given. The Bread and Puppet is without actors and and are their expensive demanding personalities. There instead or are puppeteers without glamor, virtuosity, bodies and voices that trained to In can impersonate. their masks they personify. Anyone "play" the King of Hell. summer After the company broke up in the of 1974, the Schumann family moved to a farm in Glover, Vermont. It now seems like a time of retrench ment. are Between the summer of 1974 and 1976 Future plans still vague. Schumann has toured Europe with small companies and has conducted a one workshops at variety of universities and colleges. The piece that I have seen since 1974, the Circus in the summer of 1976, seems more static

80 a than in the past. There is lot of repetition, and the retreat (with the a times) from moral and political protest has left it little churchy. Allegory has at center petrifies fast. Political protest always been the of Schumann's and even from the sixties religious vision, pieces and early seventies had a their didactic and propagandistic elements subsumed into vision of suf was never fering and compassion that simply partisan. The image of the Christ as a was not revolutionary the convenient sloganeering young Marx man The on was ist, but the of suffering. taking of suffering revolution enough. It is difficult to tell where Schumann will go from this point. is in is me While he hardly in retirement Glover, it unclear to where he will engage next.

NOTES

1 It is to on interesting note, by the way, that film, where distortion is the visual the of the Bread and on norm, power Puppet Theater that depends exaggeration of size and of time is neutralized. Because of the subjective irregularity entirely visual plasticity we are too of film detached from the perspective of the viewer fixed in a human scale to experience the necessary disparity. Recently the innovative filmmaker, Chris Marker, some it see has done work with Bread and Puppet, and will be interesting to how he deals with this The PBS film was a washout. problem. 2 in an Peter Schumann interview with Margarita Barab, Country Journal, Plainfield, Vermont, July 18, 1974, p.6. 3 No. discusses Stefan Brecht, TDR, Vol. 14, # (T47), Schumanns theological direc tions in his essay on Sacral Theatre. 4 to his own use of the word "beautiful" and wishes to make it Schumann objects clear that he is not striving for the decorative. 5 Barab interview. 6 Barab interview.

Appendix I The Famous Bread Recipe

in a Begin with fresh rye, ground hand grinder instead of milled. Mix 6 water to pounds of grain with lukewarm pudding consistency. Let sit for two starter or three or in a warm days with dough four days without it, spot. as Add water needed. When it smells strong enough, add another 6 pounds 81 more water of fresh ground rye, knead for about 20 minutes with and 3 small handfuls of salt. Flour hands and board and shape loaves. This should one make 6 loaves of 4-5 pounds. Bake at about 275? for to one-and-a-half hours.

Appendix II

CHARLOTTE'S WAG

? Sid Blum

CRITICISM / JAMES BRESLIN

Allen Ginsberg: The Origins of "Howl" and "Kaddish"

become aware of Allen Most literary people have probably first Ginsberg in self-elected and controversial role as through the media, his public figure a new has over and prophet of age. Ginsberg's public personality changed defiant and histrionic man of the fifties to the years?from the angry young activist of the sixties and the bearded and benign patriarch and political remained one that most seventies?but the personality has literary people of find hard to take seriously. Compare Ginsberg's reception with that 82