Quarlous and Winwife visit the office of their friend John Littlewit, a legal clerk. Both men want to marry Littlewit's mother, Lady Purecraft. They argue over which of them has the better chance of winning her heart. They are joined by other characters, including Bartholomew Cokes, who has come to collect a license to marry Grace Welborn. Littlewit invites the characters to come to the Bartholomew Fair to see the puppet show he has put on. Adam Overdo, a judge and Grace Welborn’s guardian, decides to disguise himself in order to uncover all the crimes committed during the fair. The plot shifts to the popular world of the Smithfield district, and Littlewit’s group soon finds itself confronted with the debauchery of the fair: Overdo is tricked by Mooncalf, a waitress, and Edgworth, a thief. Edgworth then steals money from Bartholomew Cokes. Overdo, in disguise, is suspected of being the thief’s accomplice. Quarlous and Winwife discover that the culprit is none other than Edgworth, and Quarlous hires him to steal Cokes’s marriage license. Overdo, Wasp (a servant of Cokes who caused a brawl) and the false preacher Zeal-of-the-Land Busy are sentenced to the gallows, while Win Littlewit and Mistress Overdo are encouraged to drink to excess. Trouble-All, a madman, has a fit of madness because no arrest warrant has been issued for Overdo, Wasp and Busy. His outburst creates a diversion and the three men manage to escape from their sentence. All the characters go to John Littlewit's puppet show, which brings together the love story of Hero and Leander and the friendship of Damon and Pythias. Zeal-of-the-Land Busy constantly interrupts the show to denounce its immoral and blasphemous nature. Puppet Dionysus puts an end to the debate by pulling up its costume, reminding Busy that puppets have no sex: its status as an "object" prompts Busy to change his mind, transforming him into a model spectator.

Not specified

Jonson Ben

Great Britain

London

Printed

Theatre

Debauchery

Fair

Religion

Love

Friendship

Comical

Farcical

English

Puppeteer

Leandre

Puppet

Waiter

Pythias

Damon

Hero (priestess)

Dionysos

Dialogue between actor and puppet

Undressed character on stage

Punching

Kicking

Puppet theatre within the theatre

Bartholomew Fair

La Foire de la Saint-Barthélemy

Polichinelle tells the Compère (sidekick) that he started selling lazzis (divertissements) to support his six lovers but fears that he will lack wit. A Magicien (Magician) helps him by sending him to a sabbat, where he can become a sorcerer. The Lazzistes come one by one and make requests which he cannot fulfil. Polichinelle promises Mlle Tonton that he will introduce her to M. l’Ingrat. He makes a miniature theatre appear for M. Bavard. Mlle Tonton and M. l’Ingrat recognise one another and have a lovers’ quarrel. M. Souverain makes a sensational entry. To support his claim that he is the greatest Lazziste, he starts a firework show and announces the beginning of the supper.

Rod and string marionette

Salley Charles-Alexandre

Comte de Caylus (Anne-Claude-Philippe de Tubières de Grimoard de Pestels de Lévis de Caylus)

France

Paris

Fart

Sabbath

Society Theatre

Licentiousness

Quarrel

Love argument

French

Polichinelle

The Interpreter

Magician

Savoyard

Pierrot

Scene of recognition

Magic act

Dialogue between characters who do not see each other

Word for another

Theatre within the theatre

Dialogue with a character in the audience

Letter

Polichinelle lazziste

A dove is saved from a vulture by the knight Theobald and finds shelter in the knight’s daughter’s (Agnes) lap. At this moment, their neighbour – a widow called Rosalinde – and her daughter Emma come to ask for Theobald’s protection against Ulrich von der Wart, who wants to grab her land. As a token of friendship, Agnes gives Emma her dove. Ulrich has hired a robber to break into Theobald’s castle to put it to the fire and the sword with the help of his group. The robbers dress as pilgrims and stop at Rosalinde’s place. But Casperl, Rosalinde’s servant, uncovers their plot and tells his madam. Theobald, his family and servants would have been lost had Emma not thought of sending the dove to Agnes, with a message to warn them. The robbers find themselves powerless. Theobald besieges Ulrich’s castle, and the latter is killed during the fight.

String marionette

Young audiences

Pocci Franz von

Germany

Munich

Gangster

Middle Ages

Widow

Knighthood

Justice

Rapacity

Pilgrimage

Morality

Castle

Drink

Crusades

Seat

Dramatic

Burlesque

Illustration by Franz Pocci for the first edition of the play

German

Nach einer Erzählung von Christoph Schmid in vier Aufzügen dramatisch bearbeitet

Knight

Dietrich le Noir

Kasperl

Guard

Servant

Horserider

Monologue

Song

Off-stage voice

Disguise

Story

Die Taube

The Dove

The story takes place in Grenada at the beginning of the 16th century. Juan Ramero, a former soldier in the army of Isabella the Catholic, is now a bellringer in a church in town. On the twentieth anniversary of the Reconquista, the inhabitants of Grenada gift a bell made with gold and silver to the old mosque, which was turned into a Catholic church, so that Juan Ramero can ring it to celebrate this anniversary. But Saïd le Maure (the Moor Saïd), who fought Juan Ramero, comes back to avenge himself. He accuses him of having stripped him of his house and of having killed his son. Since then, he became a magician by making a deal with the devil Satanas, and he took advantage of the gullibility of Lola, the servant, to get into the house. In fact, Saïd’s son is not dead – on the day of the last battle between Christians and Muslims, Juan Ramero came across three men fighting over the baby’s crib. Juan Ramero saved him, baptised him under the name Andrès and raised him as his son. However, Saïd knows nothing about this and wants to kill Juan Ramero, his daughter Carmen and Andrès, whom he believes to be Ramero’s son. He makes a deal with Satanas, who grants him the power to transform humans. Saïd chases Juan Ramero and his children in the desert, where he turns Carmen into a myrtle and Andrès into a roebuck. Juan Ramero reveals the whole truth to Saïd. To redeem himself, the latter calls upon Azaël -Satanas’ enemy – who gives the children their original form back. They all make peace and go back to Grenada to start a new life.

Manuscript

Orientalism

Bell

Revenge

Foundling

Exile

Fantastic

Fantasy

Adolphe Joly, La Cloche du diable (title page)

Devil

Magic spell

Incantation

Comic distortion of language

Aside

Apparition of the Devil

Metamorphosis

Aria

La Cloche du diable

The devil's Bell

On a rainy night, Pulcinella comes back home, prepares his bed and lies down in it. He has just fallen asleep when his friend Felice knocks on his door and asks for shelter from the storm. Felice has just seen Gilda, his fiancée, with a bersagliere (a soldier from a special corps of the Italian army) at the Teatro di San Carlo – the opera of Naples. Overcome with jealousy, he decides to go home but he cannot find his keys. After listening to his friend, Pulcinella offers him a chair to sleep in for the night. Felice cannot fall asleep and starts singing and screaming. Then he imagines that he is fighting the bersagliere and he throws all of Pulcinella’s furniture out of the window, including the bed. Gilda arrives at this moment. She explains that the bersagliere is her brother. She has come to tell Felice that he is going to inherit a large sum of money. Out of joy, Felice promises two millions liras to Pulcinella, who shouts: “per te sarò un principe, per lei sarò un signore, per questo colto pubblico umile servitore” (“for you, I will be a prince, for her I will be a lord, and for this cultured audience, an humbler servant”).

Ferrajolo Pasquale

Italy

Naples

Night

Treason

Inheritance

Italian

ovvero Temporale a Mezzanotte

Pulcinella

Fiancé

Felice Sciosciammocca

Fiancée

Thunderbolt

Sound of rain

Misunderstanding

Sleeping character

Word warping

Address to the public

Throwing objects

'Na nuttata 'e guai

A night of troubles or Storm at midnight

On his way to Paris, young d’Artagnan bumps into a stranger accompanied by a gorgeous woman he calls Milady. The stranger steals from him a reference letter addressed to Tréville – the captain of the musketeers. In Paris, d’Artagnan meets Tréville and earns the trust of the three musketeers Athos, Porthos and Aramis when he fights with them against the Cardinal Richelieu’s guards. The king gives the three musketeers and d’Artagnan thanks for their courage. Then, d’Artagnan saves Costanza – the queen’s lady-in-waiting. She entrusts him with a mission – to save the queen from a trap set by Richelieu. The queen gave aglets to the duke of Buckingham, who is in love with her, but they had been gifted to her by the king. In order to make the king aware of this relationship between the queen and the duke, the cardinal suggests that he organise a party and ask the queen to wear the aglets for the occasion. D’Artagnan then goes to London with the three musketeers, manages to recover the aglets and so to save the queen’s reputation.

Rod marionette

Palermo

Typed or electronic text with handwritten annotations

Bravery

Impossible love

Plot

Cloak-and-dagger novel

Heroic

d'Artagnan

Milady

Innkeeper

Jean-Armand du Peyrer, earl of Tréville

Choir

Aramis

Athos

Porthos

Jussac

Louis XIII

Landlord

Bonacieux

Lady

Duke of Buckingham

Cardinal Richelieu

Earl of Rochefort

Anne of Austria

Queen

Chancellor

Duel scene

Spying scene

Sword fight

Spectacular turn of events

Dance

I tre moschettieri

The three musketeers

One morning, in a house with a garden, two children walk a robot-dog and ask each other questions about the world: how can we measure love? why does the sky change colours? when a flower is plucked, does it hurt?
The children keep asking questions, and try to answer some of them: is a storm just an angry cloud? can we find infinity where the sea ends?
This journey in the world of whys is completed by several stories in which eccentric characters like a balloon-hippopotamus, a widow-caterpillar, and a cow-fish mix with Humpty Dumpty, Hansel and Gretel, and the Little Prince. The children tell their stories while doing household chores. The widow-caterpillar saw her husband die, run over by a bike, but she remains cheerful. The balloon-hippopotamus has been floating in the sky since the previous summer, but only the little girl can see it. As for the cow-fish, it appeared the day several cows fell in the sea and transformed after eating seaweed. The last story of the day chosen by the children is the one about Bicho Papão (Bogeyman) because he is not so evil after all.

Rod puppet

Full-view manipulation

Costume puppet

Actor and puppet

All audiences

Portugal

Porto

Identity

Topsy-turvy world

Nature

Childhood

Animals, Mythical

Philosophical tale

João Paulo Seara Cardoso, A Cor do Céu, Teatro de Marionetas do Porto, 2004.

Bartholomew Fair

Polichinelle lazziste

Die Taube

Nach einer Erzählung von Christoph Schmid in vier Aufzügen dramatisch bearbeitet

La Cloche du diable

'Na nuttata 'e guai

ovvero Temporale a Mezzanotte

I tre moschettieri

A Cor do Céu

A Piece of Cake

Sol, solet, on ets?

Ceci n'est pas un nez