Puppet Masters

The New Victory Theater opens its new season with Shona Reppe’s puppet rendition of Cinderella (The Duke on 42nd Street, September 18-28), the classic fairytale set in a table-top sized world where Cinderella must battle her sinister step sisters to win the heart of the prince. Part of New Victory’s Scottish Festival, Reppe makes use of various styles of hand puppetry to tell a visually intricate version of this well known story. Literally Alive will explore Oscar Wilde’s beautiful fairytale, The Selfish Giant (September 13-October 25), in a musical adaption by Michael Sgouros and Brenda Bel at the Players Theatre, using dance, puppetry, music, and storytelling.

Vital Children’s Theater will turn the usual elementary school hierarchy upside-down this month in The Bully, a John Gregor-David L. Williams musical about Lenny, the nerd, and Steve, the bully, and their adventures at the wrong school where they have to work together to survive, and end up discovering they may not be as different as they originally thought. If you didn’t get a chance to enjoy the Theatreworks production at the Lucille Lortel Theatre, Click, Clack, Moo will have a second coming this year at Manhattan Children’s Theatre (September 19-November 8). Based on the book by Doreen Cronin with pictures by Betsy Lewin, this hilarious musical comes from the minds of Billy Aronson (book), Kevin Del Aguila (lyrics), and Brad Alexander (music). The story follows the tribulations of Farmer Brown’s cows when they decide to start typing out their demands and protesting their working conditions.

At the West Side YMCA, Hudson Vagabond Puppets will stage Jemima Puddle Duck (September 12-13), the story of an absent-minded duck who almost gets tricked into becoming duck soup by a handsome foxy-whiskered gentleman. For budding musical theater fans, The Brooklyn Theatre Arts Project production of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat (September 11-27) might be the ticket, set to play at the Players Theatre. Andrew Lloyd Webber’s playful reimagining of the biblical story of Joseph is replete with vibrant musical numbers and a technicolor sensibility fit for the whole family.

Outside of the Manhattan area, Puppetworks has their usual fare of marionette theater in Park Slope with Peter & The Wolf and The Frog Prince (September 5-December 20), a double feature of the two classic stories adapted by Nicolas Coppola for marionettes. On Staten Island, The Great Russian Water Circus (September 8-October 25) will take up residence in the Staten Island Mall featuring 50 acrobats, jugglers, magicians, clowns, and synchronized swimmers, 350 spectacular costumes, and 75,000 gallons of water.