Description
This is a copy of the handout given at John Tartaglia's Puppet class at the 2011 Broadway Teachers Workshop
Materials
Full Lesson Plan
For your puppet to appear natural, your arm should be held at a right angle to the floor with the lower half of your arm parallel to the floor, thus "grounding" the puppet. Do not allow your puppet to lean from side to side. Thank of your hand as the head, your wrist as its neck, and your forearm as the rest of its body. In life, we walk around with our head centered on our neck and our neck centered on our bodies, so inyour puppety try to do the same. Proper wrist and hand placement will look like your puppet (or "person") is standing straight and tall, looking straight foward, not leaning awkwardly.
The basic technique consists of opening your hand on each syllable and closing it in between. The attached photo illustrates how it should look if you were saying, "Hello."
Here are some general rules to go by:
1) Open on each syllable and close afterward unless...
2) There are a lot of syllables in a fast or consistent manner. Then, you sometimes have to cheat a bit and “skip” a few syllables. For example, if you were singing “SUPERCALIFRAGILISTICEXPIALIDOCIOUS” at a very quick tempo, you’d open on the underlined syllables only -
SU PER CA LI FRAG I LIS TIC EX PI AL I DO CIOUS
Look in the mirror as you’re talking with your puppet. It should look as if that puppet is staring right at you. If you’re speaking with your puppet and it looks like he’s looking all over the place, or slightly off, then you have to adjust your eye focus.
The seamless combination of proper hand, wrist, and arm placement, eye contact, and lip sync creates puppet fluidity. It should look like your puppet has a life of its own, and should move freely, without jerkiness or choppiness.
Resources:
"Peepers": www.peeperspuppet.com
