After a prologue in which a marionette summarizes the plot, the scene opens in Juno’s bedroom at 3 a.m. Jove and Mercury, drunk and dressed as burglars, break the window to get in. Jove drives Mercury away and tries to sleep but he wakes up Juno, who picks a quarrel with him. She is furious and she decides to go to Hell and fetch two snakes which will kill Hercules and his mother in retaliation for Jove’s unfaithfulness. At the gates of Hell, Juno orders snakes and meets Blind Boy and Columbus the Parrot, who are carrying a bag. They are introduced to Pluto and his favorite snake, Slimy-Go-Gurgle-and-Twirl. They are sentenced to boil in the cauldron of Hell, but Columbus states that he has a present for Pluto in his bag. Pluto asks to see it. The present is an egg containing six other eggs, which are all of different colours and are placed one inside the other. Out of the smallest one hatches the “Worm of Worms,” Cockatrice, who kills all the snakes in Hell and terrifies everybody. Pluto gives his ring to Blind Boy and asks him to take Cockatrice away, but Blind Boy informs him that he is his mother and offers to explain how it happened. They all sit in front of a small theatre, where the story of Cockatrice’s birth is narrated. In the cockney neighborhood of London, Jove, dressed up as a cock, steps into Blind Woman and Blind Boy’s shop in order to buy pigeon milk. He hands over an egg to Blind Boy, since he is blind and therefore cannot see Cockatrice, who is about to hatch, for a single glance at Cockatrice would prove fatal - it would even kill him to see himself in a mirror. Jove asks Blind Boy to be Cockatrice’s mother and to never reveal to him who his father is. After hatching, Cockatrice befriends Blind Boy, and they decide to travel the different worlds together. After the performance ends, Blind Boy, Cockatrice, and Parrot leave Hell in order to rescue Hercules from the snakes sent by that Juno sent.

String marionette

Not specified

Craig Edward Gordon

Italy

Marina di Pisa

Printed excerpts

Unfaithfulness

Latin Mythology

Hell

Monster

Evil

Descent into hell

Fantasy

Comical

Satirical

Parodistic

English

Jupiter - Parrot - Pluto - Cockatrice & Blind-Boy

1st version

Puppet

Juno

Jupiter (Jove)

Mercury

Worker

Blind Boy

Blind

Parrot

Pretty Polly

Columbus

Servant

Devil

Pluto

Slimy-Go-Gurgle-And-Twirl

Snake

Cockatrice

Basilic

Worm

Cock, cockerel

Theatre within the theatre

Egg eclosion

Verbal imitation

Argument

Blind character

Disguised character (false identity)

Analepsis (Flash-back)

Anachronism

Avista

Hell (1916)

Enfer

Clara, a young teenage girl, has killed herself. The day after, the Arpenteur (surveyor) questions several of her relatives to try and understand the circumstances of her death. Whilst he looks for the reasons that led to this act, he also tries to grasp the reasons that motivate him to live. Each of Clara’s relatives describe memories they had with her and provide contradictory stories of her last moments. Dylan, her boyfriend, admits he felt that she had no desire to live. From the hereafter, Clara observes the same feeling in others. She hears the song that Dylan hums for her and tries to call for him, but to his eyes, she remains invisible. Adrien, Pierre, and Sylvain, whose job is to start fires, say that they saw Clara with the Passeur (the ferryman). In a flashback, we can see Clara asking the Passeur to choose how she is going to die. A chorus of naiads then describes how she drowned in the river. The Arpenteur asks the Passeur to bring Clara back from the dead. The Arpenteur solves a riddle, and the Passeur allows those who were close to Clara to see her one last time. Clara appears and sees how they all suffer, but she reassures them and tells them that she is happier dead than alive.

France

Paris

Printed

Suicide

Mysterious death

Remembrance

Grief

Quest

Afterlife

Lust

fleuve

Love

Tragic

Philosophical tale

Fantastic

Éloi Recoing, Un instant suicidaire, Théâtre aux Mains Nues, 2008

French

Concerto pour marionnettes à la mémoire d'un ange

Dead woman

Smuggler

Lover

Naïade

Dance

Aria

Chorus

Reunion

Dead talking character

Ghost

Un instant suicidaire

A suicidal moment

The protagonist, Franz, is a young Viennese scientist who, during a hypnosis session conducted by Mesmer, learns that his cousin Angèlica, with whom he is in love, is in great danger. He decides to go to her rescue and, after many adventures, arrives in Budapest to find that she has just died. Convinced that she has been hypnotised by the alchemist Adam Le Fay, he keeps her body in ice, brings her back to his laboratory and tries various experiments to resurrect her. He fails and is accused of her murder by Napoleonic troops who have just entered Vienna. Sentenced to death, he is saved at the last moment by Le Fay who explains to him that if one of them dies, the other also perishes. They duel, Franz throws himself on Le Fay's sword, and both die at the same time. It is clear that they are two sides of the same personality, symbolising the conflict between rationalism and superstition.

Actor and puppet

Shadow theatre

Automaton

Adults

Sirera Rodolf

Spain

Valencia

Rationalism

Science

Religion

Superstition

Adventure

Alchemy

Symbolism

Hypnotism

Spiritisme

Death

Double

Divination

Supernatural

Dramatic

Melodramatic

Catalan

Obra per a titelles i actors

Savant

Alchemist

Old man

Doctor

Franz-Anton Mesmer

Homes I Dones Espectadors de la sessió d'hipnotisme

Coachman

Horserider

Lady

Innkeeper

Maid

Hangman

Corpse snatcher

Prison guard

Priest

Voisine

Funfair Traveller

Bookseller

Valet

Carpenter

Soldier

Executioner

Officer

Narrator

Magic act

Throws

Projected shadows

Surprise effect

Hypnosis session

Masked characters

Sword fight

Prolepsis (Flash-forward)

Imbroglio

La mirada de l'alquimista

The alchemist's gaze

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.

Nordmann Jean-Gabriel

Meung-sur-Loire

Childhood

Illness

Unrequited love

Parents

Grotesque

Fable théâtrale pour comédiens et marionnettes

Polichinelle

Director

Father

Mother

Nurse

Schoolteacher

Scene fragment

Address to the public

Song

Blow-with-a-stick

Allusion to current political events

Seduction scene

Fight

Sous le masque tu es mortel pauvre orphelin !

Behind the mask you are mortal poor orphan!

Whilst she is walking on a beach, Caroline, a puppeteer, tells Filip the story of how she met him twenty years ago. The action of the play goes back to that time, when she was a student and was attending her last drawing class. The teacher gives them a horse, which suddenly bursts in the classroom. Sacha learns that her father is dying. Caroline offers to go with her and so she can say her last goodbye. They drive there with Raphaël, whose girlfriend Marie lives close to their final destination. When they arrive at Marie’s house, Raphaël learns that Marie has been cheating on him with his brother. He still decides to stay with her. Caroline and Sasha leave and arrive in the holiday cottage of one of their classmates. There, Caroline meets Filip. They share a night of love, but at dawn, he is gone. Caroline and Sasha continue their journey where they witness an accident, and they arrive in the village where Sasha’s father lives. Sasha goes to join him whilst Caroline walks along the little streets and meets the villagers. Sasha comes back and announces that her father died. She’s holding a picture of herself when she was a child, and starts talking to the picture and telling it about her passion for puppets. The next day, Sasha and Caroline attend the funeral, and then take a plane to go back home.

Direct Manipulation Bunraku-type Puppetry

Human sized puppet

Charleville-Mézières

Electronic text

Journey

Passion

Future

Road-movie

Realist

François Cervantès, Attends-moi, Charleville-Mézières, 2010.

Writer

Puppeteer

Student

Teacher

Neighbour

Brother

Girl friend

Child

Teenager

Sister

Aunt

Recounting of memories

Classroom scene

Animal cry

Simultaneous scenes

Night scene

Burial

Dreamt scene

Duplication

Attends-moi

Wait for me

In a country at war, a child soldier has managed to escape a military camp. She now goes to school. As she speaks with her teacher, Ismé’s past comes back to her in flashback. We learn about her past as a girl soldier, as well as the past of the children she fought with – more particularly that of Menka, who, after having been raped and having lost her first child, asked Ismé to take care of her second child.