Tales from the Arabian Nights - Puppets

At the top are two sketches I did for the GENIE Puppets required for the ALLADIN segment of TALES FROM THE ARABIAN NIGHTS. The bulk of the Shadow Puppetry in this show was utilized for this middle part of the production. The actor (PAT DIAS) playing Alladin on stage entered the small door under the shadow screen and his adventures within the magic cave were then represented by his "puppet self" while he spoke the dialogue off stage.

JULIE MURPHY & JANET SWAIN acted as the puppeteers here and with very little advance training from me, since I was also appearing in the show on stage. I showed them some basic techniques and movements and let them take it from there. They did an incredible job, especially since neither one had ever worked a puppet before!

Alladin was a very simple silhouette figure about 18 inches high. A single rod was affixed to his torso and another to his jointed right arm. The much sought after Lamp was a  prop cutout that sat on it's pedistal in a fixed groove at the bottom of the shadow screen.

Both the GENIE OF THE LAMP & THE GENIE OF THE RING were "animated" figures. The RING is seen in the frame grab at the bottom. A central rod supported the cutout face with hand-tinted plastic features. A tube just larger than this rod was affixed to the plastic circle just behind the face, tinted in a starburst pattern. The Puppeteer moved the puppet toward the screen from behind allowing the GENIE to "appear & disappear" magically, and also rotated the plastic circle behind the face to make the ring appear to levitate in space. Very simple and effective.

The GENIE OF THE LAMP was even simpler. Shaped like a flame with a face, this puppet had eye pupils that could shift from side to side by use of a rod. The effect of the flickering flame was as simple as moving the puppet back and forth from the screen in tight movements and the eyes moving to focus on Alladin as it "Spoke" to him was a chilling effect.