NPF ‘09 Gallery NPF ‘09 Itinerary

Read yesterday’s post here.

Day Seven: Jim Henson Day

Seeing as how all workshops have finished for the festival, we spent our last day celebrating Jim Henson Day - that’s what it’s marked in the festival program as. (Those following on Twitter already know more about this, but I’ll recap a little for everyone else a little further on)

What today meant was we got to go to the Centre for Puppetry Arts, here in Atlanta, and not just take a look around (the Centre is also home of UNIMA USA and a permanent Jim Henson exhibition) their three floored building, but also see a show in their theatre; and have a special welcome by the Jim Henson Legacy, along with Jane and Heather Henson (wife and daughter respectively). More pics of the Centre can be found on my Flickr set.

As with our afternoon shows, the trip was done in two lots, with the Blue group (mine) going first. Yay!

We were provided buses to get to the Centre, and we loaded up at 9am. The show started at 9.30am, so that left us with a little time beforehand to wander the exhibition space. I’ll get to that a bit more in a minute. (Before you even ask: there were no photo/video taking allowed in the Centre’s exhibition; hence, no photos of anything other than the building itself.  I really wanted to take pics, but there were lots of Centre staff wandering around, and someone even got told off for trying, so I wasn’t about to risk it)

We then entered the theatre, a small space fitting about 100-150 people (the seating is cushion-covered benches, so you could squeeze more in than normal venues). Before we started the show, a short intro was provided Vince Anthony, the director of the Centre, followed by Jane and Heather. Their intro was a sort of conversational ramble on Jim and how he helped found UNIMA USA (up until then, UNIMA did not have a branch in the US, despite having them elsewhere in the world), and how they were happy to have the Centre be a home for the collection (they hope to have a larger permanent collection/wing in the future).

Then, we had a very special event: a spokesperson (I forget the official title, but it was something like Director of Marketing) for the Mayor of Atlanta read out a proclamation. It declared that Jim Henson, for his work in puppetry, his promotion and support of children’s education, and for his worldwide award-winning excellence… July 18th is now known as Jim Henson Day in Atlanta!!! And here I was thinking the festival program was just an honorary title! 

So the people at the National Puppetry Festival were the first people to hear this official announcement; Jane and Heather received a plaque with the proclamation on it, and naturally, everyone in the audience was overjoyed. There’s something interesting that happened when we viewed the exhibition/Centre. If puppetry is like a religion, this Centre would be Mecca, and Henson would be able to walk on water. There’s something about Henson that manages to bring all puppeteers together - in awe - and excited about what can be done/is being done in the realm of puppetry. 

Ok, I’m going to write sideways now, and return briefly to the exhibition. 

Funnily enough, when I saw the poseable replica of Kermit, or the huge Big Bird in the glass case upon entering the Centre, I didn’t bat an eyelid. But when I rounded the corner I saw a DRD from Farscape and just wanted to drool. … I know, I know, I’m sad . They also had displays of many of the characters from The Muppets and Fraggle Rock (the large and small versions of the puppets in terms of the latter), an animatronic mechanism from Dinosaurs, some of the models and puppets from Labyrinth, as well as Emmet Otter’s Jug-Band Christmas, and stuff on Sid the Science Kid. There were video screens playing behind-the-scenes excerpts and footage from shows, along with interviews with cast and crew members; plus plenty of drawings, plans and other ephemera. There were even some things to play with: a range of fleece-covered faces and laminated eyes, noses and mouths… then you can create your own muppet face! There were also a selection of puppet materials (fleece, fur, etc.) that you could touch and see the texture. Pretty neat stuff!

Now, back to where I was discussing the announcement of Jim Henson Day; whilst we were in the theatre, we watched a performance of The Little Pirate Mermaid (the show I wanted to see initially on Tuesday, but got cancelled and replaced with a show I didn’t go to anyway). You can find a review of that under the related posts heading on my site.

Once the show was over, we had more time to wander the Centre. There was also a nice little reception (with food, mmm!) downstairs in a small room. I sat with @staceyrebecca and then we had a wander around. I went upstairs, where they have their offices/activities rooms, and Centre staff were running small workshops making paper puppets. Then I headed back to the exhibition because I knew there was something else special: Heather Henson was doing a short tour of it. She explained each of the exhibits and talked about the people involved (unfortunately, we had about 20 minutes left of our trip to the Centre left, so we didn’t get through even half of the exhibits before we had to leave). Luckily, John Tartaglia and Leslie Carrara-Rudolph (both Muppeteers) were also in attendance, and added a little bit more insider info too.

Oh yes, I bought myself a piece of Henson-alia whilst at the Centre; there’s a puppet store (with a range of puppets, Henson stuff, puppet books and kits, etc etc) and I got myself a Kermit book bag. It’s pretty cool!

So it was time to head back to Georgia Tech, and have some lunch. After lunch we had two shows; Poli Degaine (the show that was supposed to be on yesterday) and Secrets History Remembers. Dinner came and went, and then we had two more things: the awards ceremony for Puppeteers of America and UNIMA USA (most of which I really had no idea what was going on, seeing as I didn’t know half the people/shows), along with the Traffle (raffle) drawings. I didn’t win what I bid on - but then, people were stuffing the boxes, since you could put in more than one bid - and almost thought no one had bid on my donated item. They announced it last, and was happy to see at least one person bid! Yay!

Finally, we had the last performance of the festival, Bride. You can find links to all the reviews below the related posts heading. There was a closing night party, but I decided not to go since I’m pretty exhausted. I said goodbye to Stacey, and here we are!

So the festival is officially over! I’ll do a wrap-up of review ratings some time soon (either before I leave or when I get back), along with a wrap-up of the workshops and festival itself too. Tomorrow’s plan is nebulous: I’m very tempted to just spend the day chilling out at the hotel, and give my feet a rest. The plan was to head out to a local mall where there is a market on, but seeing as how I’ve spent oh, 99.99% of my souvineer budget, I may give it a miss. 

Read next day’s post here.

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