Thoughts from the TED talks

TED Talks

Handspring Puppet Company TED Talk

*Joey the horse from War Horse is a puppet created by them. He must be able to be ridden, to breath, to walk, canter and gallop, he must have emotional impact (the emotions of a horse are apparent through their ear movements (back for scared, forwards for playful, around for observation - the horses hearing is almost more important to them than their eyesight).

*Puppets are ‘dead' objects brought to life, "the actor struggles to die on stage, the puppet struggles to live”. 

The true life is breathed metaphorically into the puppet by the puppeteer(s)(link to Motion Capture)

 (in this case three for Joey, one at the hindquarters for tail (side to side and up and down) and legs, one at the ‘heart centre’ for the front two legs and breath up and down movement (anatomically incorrect, but this does not matter as 1. side to side movement is not as easy to see, and the audience can believe that this is breathe) plus a puppeteer who controls the head (ears, movement of the neck)

synchronisation of the three puppeteers is what truly brings the puppet to life, example, the whinnying and breath of the horse is not recorded, but starts with a puppeteer and spreads through to the others organically (without any verbal communication between the puppeteers).

This made me think of a recent film released called The Hobbit (Both ‘An Unexpected Journey and ‘The Desolation of Smaug’) and of the films The Lord of the Rings (1,2,3). In conversations I’ve had with my best friend who has a film degree, he commented that the reason he believed that the recent Hobbit films were not as good because the production team relied too heavily on CGI, when the could have used actual actors:

This then made me think about the amazing performance of Andy Serkis as Gollum, and the fact that, in my opinion, this performance was so good because he (Serkis) was on set in full Mo-Cap suit with Martin Freeman, much more like a theatre stage set rather than Freeman interacting with a green screen process. (Also, Serkis’ voice was captured at the same time). To me, this is like a 21st century version of puppetry.

Then, I begun thinking about Smaug, the main antagonist of the second Hobbit movie, who also happens to be a dragon. Although I have yet to see the dragon puppet we are using, I believe this behind the scene look at Benedict Cumberbatch doing the Mo-Cap and voice for the dragon will be super useful for us.

Julie Taymor - TED Talk - Spiderman, The Lion King and life on the creative edge

What is the Idiograph for Beowulf (The circle for The Lion King, a sandcastle for The Tempest) 

Theatre is a ‘rough magic’, the stage hands coming on stage to water the sandcastle are visible and obvious, the audience still ’see’ them, then the light changes and the audience see only the water and sandcastle, they ‘suspend their disbelief’.

The mechanics used in the show must be equal to the story (puppet, scenery etc must be as good/not better, than the story or visa versa)