Talking Puppet Theory and Process with Students on Zoom

by Drew Allison

Professor Rachel Briley’s Puppet Class at the University of NC, Greensboro

I did not want to write about the pandemic. I sat down to write with another topic in mind. Yet my fingers tap away in that very direction.

We have wrung ourselves out thinking about this pandemic, talking about this pandemic, surviving physically and economically during this pandemic, and trying to find the sliver linings during this pandemic. I am as weary as you are as we try to figure this all out.

We are devastated again and again as we learn of loss right from our own puppetry wheelhouse; friends, colleagues, legends in the field. All gone in the blink of an eye.

As performers, presenters and makers, we’ve worked so hard on our seasons, schedules, performances and projects. To see them disappear not instantly, but consistently in a slow, methodical stream is painful. It’s a bleeding wound we can’t seem to clot. It hurts.

But it really is impossible not to seek and find the aforementioned silver linings in all of this. We find ourselves becoming more and more adept with virtual experiences. We know what Zoom meetings are all about. Amazing events and happenings are all around us, like Great Small Works’ Toy Theatre Festival, a Puppetry Virtual Town Hall Meeting, Guild meetings with attendees nationwide. Workshops. Museum tours and Performances all at our fingertips!

My own personal revelation of this odd fruition was a Zoom meeting with Professor Rachel Briley’s Puppet Class at the University of NC, Greensboro. How amazing to talk puppet theory and process for an hour with these students. It was so invigorating to see their enthusiasm, inquisitiveness and dare I say it, glee, as we took a virtual tour around the Grey Seal studio.

I came out of that Zoom experience uplifted. Our conversation was therapeutic. It is boosts like this that keep us going. I say celebrate these moments! Relish them. They will sustain us through.