Tribute to a Legendary Puppeteer

My good friend, Enid, was a master puppeteer. Pretty much everything I know about puppetry I learned from her. She lived from 1937 to 2016.

When I first began working at the puppet theater, Enid showed me a tiger marionette she had built. "This was the first puppet I made," she said to me between shows I worked the spotlight for. I looked at the marionette. It was wooden, with the tiger walking on two feet in an anthropomorphic way. "He has a circus act in one of my shows. Would you like to give him a try?"

"I would love to," I said.

Enid held the marionette and demonstrated how to manipulate it. A while later, I nervously stepped on stage with the marionette and maneuvered it as she had instructed . The audience was quite small, with few others besides my parents in attendance. It was probably not my best performance, but I was a total newbie.

"Congrats in your first performance!" she said to me after the show.

"Thanks," I replied.

A few years passed. Enid and a mutual friend developed a Cinderella show and asked me to run the spotlight for them. As I watched them rehearse, I admired the gorgeous puppets Enid had built. They looked especially beautiful with the spotlight shining on them.

In 2007, nine years before her passing, I said to Enid, "I would like to build my own show. I am thinking of doing Aesop fables, particularly "The Cat and the Fox."

"Wonderful!" said Enid. "I can build you a cat and a fox." She asked to see my hand and measured it. A few weeks later, she presented me with the puppets. They both looked amazing, but I was particularly impressed with the fox. To this day it is my favorite puppet and one of my most treasured possessions.

"The first thing you do when making a show is you write the script," she told me. "Always make sure your show is finished before you book it anywhere. And don't even try to go higher than fourth grade." She knew these things after decades of doing puppetry.

After writing most of the script, I presented it to Enid. "This will work," she told me. "I think you should end with the tiger falling into the pit he dug." The scene was about a tiger who dug a pit in his lair to trap other animals. Now, every time I perform the show, the kids laugh at the tiger falling into his own pit.

"I can coach you on voices," she told me. "How will you do the fox's voice?"

I demonstrated the voice, which was high pitched an a little nasally. "Try making it a little rougher," she said.

I did so, and she continually worked with me until she thought the fox's voice sounded acceptable.

Even though Enid never performed "Furry Fables" with me, her craft lives on in the show. It would not be what it is without her input. After several modifications I now call it "Furry Fables 2.0". It is my most popular show. The President of the theater liked a video if it so much that she invited me to perform it at the theater.

Enid used to open her shows with a scene where she was looking for her orangutan, Pepper. She would come on stage with the words, "I can't find my friend, Pepper. Have you seen him?"

"No," said the audience.

"If you see him, shout it out," she told them, and went backstage.

"Pepper, where are you?" she would call out while manipulating the puppet from behind the stage. Pepper would pop out in a few places.

"There he is!" shouted the kids.

After popping out a couple of times, Pepper would pick up a banana left on stage.

"There you are, Pepper!" She came out holding the puppet. "You can have that banana after the show." She would then introduce whichever show she performed that day.

I loved this intro so much that for my next performance of "Furry Fables 2.0" I will be doing something similar, except with a different animal. I'm thinking of using a rabbit and a carrot. I mean it as a tribute to Enid.

In the summer of 2016, some of my puppeteer friends and I were collaborating on a group show called, "Something's Fishy", a show with fish marionettes. We performed it every summer for at least seven or eight years. Enid and I were both in the cast, along with some others. Our mutual friend, who wrote and directed the show, called everyone into the green room while Enid was absent.

"I have some bad news," she told us. "Enid is dying."

A little while later, Enid passed in hospice care from cancer. Our director friend had to miss a performance of "Somethings Fishy" to attend her funeral. The rest of us carried on with the show as Enid would have wanted us to.

Our mutual friend informed me that Enid had recently become a Christian before her passing. I look forward to seeing her in Heaven someday. I hope she's entertaining all the kids up there.

Enid was not only an amazing puppet maker, but a wonderful performer as well. She was truly a master at her craft and enjoyed passing it down to the next generation of puppeteers. My goal as a puppeteer is to be as awesome as she was.