The Compère (Stooge) is looking forward to the next Polichinelle performance. But one of the actresses, Mademoiselle Godon, is not happy with her role and complains to the author Farinet. A quarrel begins between her sister Manon and their mother. Infuriated, Farinet leaves with his play, which he lends to another theatre. Polichinelle must therefore improvise an impromptu: in it, he plays the lover who abducts his mistress Lolotte, with her consent, to force her father Géronte to let them marry.

Rod and string marionette

Not specified

France

Paris

Printed

Theaters of the Parisian fairs

Playwright

Argument

Seduction

Kidnapping

Comical

Satirical

Manuscript of La Pièce manquée et de L'Impromptu de Polichinelle (Bibliothèque nationale de France, Ms. fr. 9318).

French

Polichinelle

The Interpreter

Poet

Pierrot

Metatheatre

Metadiscourse on puppet theatre

Aria

Final song

Prologue

La Pièce manquée et L'Impromptu de Polichinelle

The missed Play and Polichinelle's Impromptu

Durand, a man from Lyon who became rich when he was living in Martinique, comes back to Lyon and tries to have news of his former servant, Guignol. He meets Niafron who tells him that Guignol is kept prisoner by his wife Madelon in their house, and that she beats him, insults him and forces him to do all the housework. Durand entrusts a “wonderful root” imported from the Americas (which is nothing but a stick) to Niafron, and asks him to give it to Guignol. Niafron uses a ruse to make Madelon leave her house: he invites her to the restaurant and leaves her there before dessert to meet up with Guignol. Niafron shows Guignol how to be obeyed: first, he must threatens Madelon with the stick and tell her “Woman, see Jérôme” then, if she persists, he must say “Woman, beware of Jérôme” and, finally, on the words “Woman, feel Jérôme” he must beat her. When Madelon returns, Guignol enforces the lesson taught by Niafron and makes his wife submit and obey him.

Glove-puppet

Mourguet Laurent

Lyon

Household

Unhappy marriage

Emancipation of women

Farcical

La Racine merveilleuse, anonymous manuscript, collection of Léopold Dor.

La Racine d'Amérique; La Racine.

ou la Racine merveilleuse

Gnafron

Madelon

Dialect as a social marker

Blow-with-a-stick

Domestic scene

Fais-me voir, Jérôme

Let me see, Jérôme

Cassandre wants to marry his daughter Colombine to the baker Pierrot, but she prefers Arlequin, his cousin, a wigmaker and the inventor of an anti-baldness cream. Cassandre is about to eat an egg from the bird Rock, but the bird steals his wig. He promises to give his daughter’s hand to anyone who will be able to bring the wig back to him. With the help of his godmother the Fée Carabosse (Wicked Fairy), Pierrot travels in the air, accompanied by Arlequin, who grabbed his leg. They arrive on an island where a crocodile almost eats Pierrot, and they embark on a small boat that breaks in half after an argument between them. On the Île des Bêtes (Island of the Beasts), the Lion is upset because it is losing its mane. Arlequin offers it the cream, but first, he tries it on Pierrot. The Lion is enthusiastic and decides to name it the Pommade du Lion (Cream of the Lion). Cassandre arrives, and when he witnesses Arlequin’s success, he gives him Colombine’s hand in marriage.

Young audiences

Séraphin Pauline

Baldness

Fairy

Invention

Island

Travel in the air

Boat trip

Broom

Reward

Forced marriage

Animal

Fantasy

Cassandre

Arlecchino

Notary

Colombine

Wicked Fairy

Lion

Monkey

Parrot

Magpie

Bird Roc

Love rivalry

Fight with an animal

Apparition

Talking animal

La Perruque de Cassandre

Cassandre's wig

Jan Klaassen meets with Langhals, whose neck inconceivably grows longer and longer. Langhals disappears when Jan Klaassen throws himself at him to break his neck. Jan Klaassen violently bangs himself. Katrijn, his wife, hears his screams and comes running: she tells him that she would have rather found him dead. Jan Klaassen wants to beat her with a stick. During their pursuit, Death appears in Katrijn’s stead. Jan Klaassen raises his stick and Death disappears. Jan Klaassen decides to go for a drink, but changes his mind at the last minute and ends the play with a song condemning alcoholism and its harmful effects.

All audiences

Netherlands

Monster

Burial

Drink

Alcohol

Spousal abuse

Dutch

Jan Klaassen

Long-neck

Death

Chase

Lengthening of a character

Langhals en de dood

Long-neck and Death

The Étudiant (Student), waiting for the Grisette (Working girl), reads her letter over and over again. When she arrives, their reunion is passionate, and the couple immediately embraces. Their lovemaking, full of noises and exclamations, catches the attention of the neighbour, Monsieur Prudhomme. Intrigued, he enters the scene and starts giving advice. Annoyed by the intrusion, the Étudiant fiercely asks him to stop bothering them, and passionately goes back to his intimate moment with the Grisette.

Adults

Monnier Henry

Student

Young girl

Sexual intercourse

Eroticism

Neighbour (man)

Erotic

Félicien Rops, frontispiece for Le Théâtre érotique de la rue de la Santé (1864).

Young woman

Monsieur Prudhomme

Letter

Off-stage voice

Situation comedy

Comedy of language

Scene of copulation

La Grisette et l'Étudiant

The Working girl and the Student

The Viennese public attends a puppet show in the Prater. The play in question features a hero who is unwillingly involved in a foursome with his lover Liesl and the Duke and Duchess of Lawin. The duel between him and the Duke is cancelled, but he loses the interest of the Duchess and the love of Liesl in the process. Death comes. The audience, which has not stopped commenting on the play, intervenes more and more loudly and the performance turns into a scandal. It is no longer clear who is a spectator, who is a puppet, until a man in a blue coat enters the stage... and cuts the strings of the puppets with a sword, thus discriminating between animate and inanimate.

String marionette

Schnitzler Arthur

Austria

Vienna

Germany

Berlin

Spectator

Unfaithfulness

Duel

Self-consciousness of puppets

Local color

Wrangle

Hanswurst

Noise

Lust

Entertainment

Burlesque

German

Marionetten

Burleske in einem Akt

Director

Bourgeois

Daughter

Count

Soldier

Waiter

Child

Duke

Father

Husband

Raisonneur

Wrestler

Dead woman

Valet

Puppet theatre within the theatre

Address to the public

Pantomime

Parody of formal language

Versified passages

Stichomythia

Metamorphosis

Character thrown out of the scene

Zum großen Wurstel

To the big sausage

Mr. Fish pays a visit to Mrs. Bones and starts a conversation with her. Mrs. Bones uses different excuses to get angry and threaten to kill Mr. Fish. She then asks him to get divorced from his wife, while offering to get a divorce from her husband for them to marry. Mr. Fish, frightened, begs Teddy, his puppeteer, to save him from this situation. The latter pulls at the puppet’s strings to take him back to the fly loft. Then a hand comes down (the puppeteer’s) and threatens Mrs. Bones, while her strings are cut one by one. Cockatrice, Mrs. Bones’ “old friend,” wants to seduce her and take her with him, but Mrs. Bones can no longer move. Cockatrice thus sends for a girl in the audience to take the puppet, which is now merely a doll. The play ends with the appearance of the face of the Governor (the puppeteer) and with a grand finale for Mrs. Bones, who ascends to heaven, to the surprise amazement of a myriad of glove puppets watching her.

Craig Edward Gordon

Italy

Bologna

Rapallo

Divorce

Anger

Woman

Punishment

Doll

Whim

Edward Gordon Craig, drawing of the heads of Mrs Bones and Mr. Fish

English

Cockatrice

Puppeteer

Apparition of the puppeteer

Flying machine

Intervention of the audience

Ascension

Mr Fish and Mrs Bones

Séraphin wants to marry his daughter Colombine to Pierrot, but she prefers Arlequin, a wigmaker and the inventor of an anti-baldness cream. Séraphin is about to eat an egg from the bird Rock, but the bird steals his wig. He promises to give his daughter’s hand to anyone who will be able to bring the wig back to him. With the help of his godmother the Fée Carabosse (Wicked Fairy), Pierrot travels in the air, accompanied by Arlequin, who grabbed his leg. They arrive on an island where a crocodile almost eats Pierrot, and they embark on a small boat that breaks in half after an argument between them. On the Île des Bêtes (Island of the Beasts), the Lion is upset because it is losing its mane. Arlequin offers it the cream, but first, he tries it on Pierrot. The Lion is enthusiastic and decides to name it the Pommade du Lion (Cream of the Lion). Séraphin arrives, and when he witnesses Arlequin’s success, he gives him Colombine’s hand in marriage.

Choisy Laure

Switzerland

Geneva

Typed or electronic text with handwritten annotations

Marcelle Moynier, the director of the Théâtre des marionnettes de Genève, with the puppets of La Perruque de l'oncle Séraphin.

Colombina

Figaro

Crocodile

Object coming to life

La Perruque de l'oncle Séraphin

Uncle Séraphin’s Wig

A theatre director has hired Polichinelle for the evening, but Polichinelle is late for the show. When he comes on, he is haunted by the ghost of his conscience, that chastises him for his very instinctive personality. Following the director’s questions concerning what is tormenting him, Polichinelle uses glove-puppets to play episodes from his childhood, when he was often punished for his misdemeanour. Once the flashback is over, Polichinelle wants to improvise some jokes, but the director forbids him from tackling political themes. As he does not know what kind of show to put on, Polichinelle keeps talking about his past – how his parents had him then abandoned him for lack of money, and his first heartbreaks. Polichinelle and the director argue. The latter summons Illness and Death, who want to take Polichinelle with them. While screaming that he is an immortal character, Polichinelle manages to drive them out – thus saving theatre and also making up with the director.