Sunday, April 19, 2009

Day of Puppetry May 30



Hold onto your sockpuppets! This is going to be great.
Thanks to the Wisconsin Puppetry Guild, the Hazel Green Opera House's annual Puppet Playwriting Contest will be expanded to an entire-- 
ta da:

Day of Puppetry
9:30-3:30 (approx.) Saturday May 30

Save the date. Make plans. It's going to be great.
Events will be in the opera house (2130 W. Main St., Hazel Green, Wis.) as well as in the Methodist Church hall that is a block away.
Right now it looks like we'll use the church hall for the puppetmaking workshop as well as lunchtime concessions. We've also got village permission to block off the street in front of the opera house for a mid-day parade.
Guest performers will be Monica Leo's Eulenspiegel Puppets presenting "The Woolly Mammoth." Monica's puppet company is in West Liberty, Iowa, and she is originally from Dubuque. 
Guild member  Pam Corcoran, of Stevens Point, Wis., is in charge of the make-and-take workshop which will be a woolly mammoth puppet. 
Tim Reed, Milwaukee, will present 'Planet Protectors'. Here is the YouTube link to see a clip from this show: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aEo8j5LmY7c
The Fever River Puppeteers (whose home is the Hazel Green Opera House) will perform the 3 winning entries in our 4th annual Puppet Playwriting Contest.


The Best Part 
I forgot to tell you that thanks to donations from the Grant County Safe & Stable Families, admission to the contest performance is free and thanks to a donation from the Wisconsin Puppetry Guild, all other events at the festival will be FREEWILL DONATION. That means it is affordable for everyone.  You just pay what you can.  Considering the state of the economy and the number of people who have lost their jobs lately, we wanted to offer a family event that everyone can afford. Any donations received will be used to jumpstart a similar event next year.

There will be more news to come as we finalize plans. (We might even have a puppet-related garageless garage sale.) If anyone has any thoughts, hopes, ideas or comments, send them along.
Keep checking this blog for updates!