The Puppets of Avenue Q
A strange thing happened as I watched Avenue Q, the Tony award-winning puppet musical now running at the RCBC theater. I was completely mesmerized by the…puppets! What mind-benders I found them to be: which was the puppet, which was the puppeteer? Who moved who?
Of course, credit goes to the performers who, I was told, trained in puppetry weeks before they rehearsed for their roles. The result was the effective blurring of lines between puppet and puppeteer, an almost seamless transference of emotion and facial expression between the two.
This, I believe, was crucial to the play, what made it hilarious and ultimately touching. Because life was depicted through puppetry, it became twice/thrice removed from our realities. We could then laugh at our sentimentalism, bigotry, racism; even find the punch line in our pain and dashed hopes. Nothing like puppets, too, to mock our fixation on sex. Frontal nudity and copulation were never this funny.
Avenue Q is what has become of Sesame Street while we're away getting a college degree. Coming back, we find a grungier, less innocent neighborhood. But we recognize old friends and feel a familiar welcome. In their stories, we still hear our favorite songs even if the notes have been rearranged. And when they shrug off life and its difficulties as “Only For Now”, we share their childlike hope.
Puppets have a way of making us believe. Sunny day, everything's a-ok...
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Rachel Alejandro as Kate Monster/Lucy the Slut and Aiza Seguerra as Gary Coleman were brilliant. But I believe everyone's favorite was Trekkie Monster (Joel Trinidad). Check out reviews by Anton of Our Awesome Planet and Mila of Watergirl, here and here.
Avenue Q runs from September 7 to September 23 at RCBC Plaza's Carlos P. Romulo Theater. It's a short run, so don't miss it!
4 comments:
Hi Socky,
What wonderful insights and observations. I totally agree with your assessment of how the puppets are so crucial to the success of the play.
Thank you so much for taking the time to watch Avenue Q and to write about it.
Lorna Lopez aka TheBachelorGirl
I like your take on puppets! And I love Sesame Street. I think I'd love to come back to it 20 years after by seeing this play.
I watched it with my family today and we all had a lot of fun! The songs were witty, the content was smart, and the actors/puppeteers did a fantastic job. Kudos to Atlantis for pulling it off!
I saw it last Friday too and we all enjoyed it! Especially my friends who knew nothing of what to expect (it's so much better when you don't read the reviews that give away too much!). Bobby Garcia did a helluva job once again, as expected. :)
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