This theatrical forum is called “Puppet Rendezvous in Chernihiv”, and this year it will mark its fifth anniversary. The idea to hold a festival in this ancient city that would acquaint children and adults with the best Ukrainian groups belongs to the managers of the Oleksandr Dovzhenko Chernihiv Regional Children’s (Puppet) Theater: its director Ihor Madzhuha and its artistic director Vitaliy Holtsov. The “Rendezvous” have been held on a triennial basis, starting from 1996.
“Our festival aims at showing the plays created by practicing theater artists who have the playwrighting talent and a good understanding of the puppet stage’s laws and the young spectators’ preferences,” emphasized Holtsov in his interview to The Day, “The festival helps the artists share interesting ideas and discoveries and discuss the existing problems in their theaters, which perform for young spectators, a complicated audience.
“It is no secret that now many Ukrainian puppeteers have to work with old properties and, quite often, in unsuitable facilities. That is why not every theater can boast new technology (lighting, sound, upgraded stage sets, etc.) in their plays.
“Since 2002 our forum has had the status of a festival of authors’ plays. We invite puppet theaters with plays in which the artistic director or one of the actors is also the playwright. The number of performing actors is limited to four.”
The festival will open on Nov. 21 with the fairy-tale-cum-game Veseli avtozabavy (Merry Auto Pastime) by the Ternopil Academic Actor and Puppet Theater. Tetyana Silchenko, the author of the play, came up with an interesting idea: to teach kids traffic rules through a game with their active participation in the adventures. The Kirovohrad Puppet Theater presents the play Hotel Murzyka (Murzik’s Hotel) in which its playwright and artistic director V. Ipatiev will speak with young spectators about the dangers of playing with fire.
The Homel Puppet Theater will bring its comical play Kazky z yarmarku (Fairy-Tales from a Fair). The Kyiv-based Kraplynka Puppet Theater will invite the audience to visit Kraina chudes (Wonderland) and the Lviv People and Puppets Theater will show Shovkova kosytsia (Silk Braid).
The hosts of the festival will also present their works: the one-man play Sumna vesela kazka (Sad Merry Tale) after Yaroslav Hrushetsky’s play will be performed by Ruslan Neupokoyev, who has also staged it. The program will end on November 23 with Khytromudryi yizhak (Smart Hedgehog), the joint production of the Chernihiv Puppet Theater and Oleksandr Kuzmin from Cherkasy. He is involved in this stage version of Ivan Franko’s Koly shche zviri hovoryly (When Animals Still Talked) as the playwright and stage director.
