What is a light curtain? And how to use it with puppets
Not to be confused with blacklight puppets - which us neon/glow-in-the-dark paints and UV lighting - a light curtain is a way of creating a performance where the puppets are visible, but the puppeteers are not. While the UV lighting/neon paints uses similar concepts detailed here, it is not exactly the same, and there is a different post written up on that particular topic.
Basically, how it works is that some lights on either side of the stage create a thin beam of light. Because the beam runs directly across the stage (ie. horizontally), it forms a ‘curtain’. Behind this curtain, nothing can be seen. - Imagine it as an invisible scrim or gauze, hanging in front of the stage. However, place anything in front of the light, or in the light, and it will be seen. So if a puppeteer walks into the light, they may be quite visible; stay behind the ‘curtain’, and they won’t be. So the puppeteers stay behind the light curtain, but hold the puppets in the beam of light. Voila! Magically disappearing puppeteers.
There are several things required to make this particular type of staging work effectively. Confusing? Well, skip to the bottom and see the video of a show I did using this light curtain effect; then come back and read the rest.
Costuming the puppeteers
The puppeteers - or any other person onstage who must be ‘invisible’ - must be completely costumed in black. Shoes, socks, pants, long-sleeved tops, gloves, and hoods, are all necessary to do this. It is important to cover every part of the body, as any light areas, like skin, will be clearly visible to the audience, and will ruin the effect of being hidden from view. This also means that jewellry and other shiny items - like belts - should not be worn.
Hoods are especially important, and require a black mesh in the eye area, so that the puppeteers can see. Even the type of materials used for the costumes are important - black is rarely actually black, but sometimes has hues of blue or red, invisible to the naked eye, but very obvious when under light curtain conditions. The puppeteers should all be wearing the same shade of black, as any differences in their shades might make one person noticeable, and the rest of the cast invisible; it can be quite annoying.
I recommend velveteen, a cheaper version of velvet, to make any costumes and curtains; it is the right shade of black, is cheap, and very light to wear. Because puppeteers are hooded, wearing black, and will be under hot stage lights, any costuming and materials should take into account the heat factor and dress accordingly.
Gloves should have elastic at the hem, so that they do not fall down during performances, and should be above elbow height. Buying evening gloves is not recommended, since most are made using a shiny material. If you do not use velveteen, it should be remembered that you MUST use a matte material, since any shine will be reflected by the stage lights.
Hiding rods and mechanisms
The brilliance of a light curtain is the ability to do magical things, like floating eyes, hands that appear from nowhere, or allowing the puppets to ’swim’ through a pretend ocean, or fly through the air. There’s such a range of things that you can do, that you will really want to experiment with staging space, different levels of play, height, width, depth… you can make things suddenly so much more fantastical.
For this reason, most puppets used with a light curtain are rod puppets, as they are easy to use and allow simple dexterity and a wide range of movement. While marionettes, muppet-types, and hand puppets all require the puppeteer to be quite close to the puppet, rod puppets allow the puppeteer to be distant. This assists in hiding the puppeteer from view, as there needs to be at most an arm’s length between the puppet and the puppeteer (read below about lighting for further explanation).
But it’s no good making just the puppeteers invisible, and have a puppet fly around in the air, only to have the audience see rods or other points of manipulation. So you will need to ensure any rods are black, and that nothing that you want ‘invisible’ is shiny or another colour. This can be quite tricky, but if you buy some black plastic-covered coathangers to use as rods, it should work fine. Alternatively, you can try gluing on some scrap strips of velveteen to any rods and handles. My puppetry lecturer at Swinburne, Ken Evans, created a sticky-backed velvet for just such uses, but unfortunately, it is made to especially for him, and I have not found any place that sells anything similar.
Staging
In order to avoid any puppeteer being seen, the backdrop or scenery behind the performers must be black as well. There are, of course, exceptions to the rule, but generally speaking you will want any areas behind the puppeteers to be dark. Imagine for a moment, you are watching a person in black walk across a completely white backdrop. Naturally, no matter how dim the lighting is, you will see the person - because they do not camouflage into the background. Now imagine a person in black walk across a black backdrop - even though you may some some slight shadow, it would be almost impossible to tell that the person is there. So you see, it is very important for the ‘invisibility’ of the puppeteers to keep the backdrop and scenery black. You should black out any windows in the venue, if there are any, and ensure that during rehearsals and performances to use only blue lights for backstage areas (no fluoros or other colours!), and keep all doors to the outside world closed. It is imperative that any external light is kept out.
If you are using a light curtain, you can do other things in terms of set design which you might not normally do in other styles. For instance, you can create black ledges, tables, benches, hides (two pieces of upright walls, hinged together), or use flats, which allow you to hide puppets and then reveal them at necessary times. You can also use these set pieces to create different levels of play, which are both comfortably high enough for the puppeteer to work with, and allow you to create fantastical scenes and movements.
You should also consider creating a set of wings or backstage area, where you can hide puppets and reveal them as needed. Because your puppets won’t be black (because you want the puppets to be seen, duh!), you will have to learn the best way to introduce them onstage in correspondence to your set design and staging needs. For instance, if a puppeteer, dressed in black, walks across the black backdrop, with a blue fish puppet in their black-gloved hands, what do you think would happen?
The audience would see the blue puppet, because it’s not camouflaged into the background. That’s fine if you want the puppet to be visible straight away, but what if you want to introduce the puppet from downstage centre, and the puppeteer needs to bring it from upstage right, where the backstage area is? In this case, the puppeteer will need to carefully hide the puppet - perhaps behind their back - until they have walked to the appropriate place to introduce the puppet, at which point, they can reveal it. This can be tricky for puppeteers, and it is recommended that a longer tech and dress rehearsal be offered, so that the puppeteers can get used to the staging. Directors too, must watch for this, as it is very easy to make the entrances and exits of puppets jerky, ill-defined, or too quick. A puppet should be introduced and exited as if it is moving in the air; slowly, surely, with smooth movements and with a clear idea of where the puppet world ground is.
As you can see, a light curtain also allows the freedom for the puppeteers to move around onstage, without necessarily being seen, and so puppeteers can walk on and offstage with no fear of having to ‘act’ or hide things from the audience. However, that does not mean that there is not a certain style of movements the puppeteer should employ while onstage.
Lighting
This is the most important part of a light curtain - duh! Without the correct lighting, the light curtain effect will not work. For non-technical people, this explanation may seem confusing, so if you don’t understand stage lighting or are new to it, you will want to ask for assistance from a local techie or venue manager to help you get it set up. You may also want to read the post on lighting design before getting into this stuff…
Here’s a more detailed explanation of the light curtain: On each side of the stage (downstage is the best, since most of your puppetry will more than likely be performed mid- to downstage) you should place a boom, or a lighting rig pole. Attached to each are profile stage lights. These particular stage lights allow you to focus the beam of the light on a very tight and specific area, and it is important to be able to do that. Other lights, such as parcans or fresnels, will not allow you as much definition, so profile lights are a must.
By focusing the profiles to face each other (ie. across the stage), and by creating a hard-edged beam, the light overlaps each other, creating a long ’single’ beam of light. It is important to get this as precise as possible, as an inch in the wrong direction, and the ‘curtain’ will not be as effective. [A better diagram will be added later]
In conjunction with this, you can also have some profiles rigged above stage, where the area of play is, that focus directly down. It is extremely important that the beams of these lights exactly overlap the side lights, otherwise there is an ill-defined area of play, and the puppeteers will be seen.
All of this may sound extremely strange, especially without seeing the actual lights and how it works practically. My company, Sticky Apple Legs, used a light curtain for our debut show. Here’s an excerpt which will help you gain a better idea of what you can do and how it all looks once set up:
The video is actually of our preview show, and you can see that we had underestimated the power of good costuming, being aware of where we entered the light curtain, and the shadows created by fat objects in the light curtain. However, you can immediately feel that the light curtain creates a certain magical atmosphere to the performance.
Light curtains can be very easy to use once you know how, but it does mean that you will require a larger budget than normal puppetry shows. It requires a venue that has a good lighting rig, flexibility with staging and curtains, the ability to block out any external light - plus additional costuming. It is very difficult to use this for any touring show, unless you have booked these kinds of venues ahead, or have your own equipment. However, it’s a lot of fun, and does allow you to do so much more with both the puppets and the puppeteers. You may also want to read the post on blacklight puppetry, which complements light curtains very well.
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