Bill’s 44th (Birthday)

Posted on July 13, 2024 by Alix Cohen in Playing Around

Bill is throwing himself a party. He whips off a calendar page to display the date and BILL’S 44th BIRTHDAY! The audience spontaneously cheers. Dancing his way to a table, he unwraps a fabric package. A yellow table cloth unfolds revealing party hats, plastic cups, a punch bowl and crudite. Liquor is unpacked. Punch is spiked, tasted, spiked, tasted. A HAPPY BIRTHDAY banner is strung across the window. He’s excited!

James, Bill, Andy Manjuck

Music is terrific throughout, evocative, integral, here, buoyant. There’s no dialogue. Potato chips are added to a buffet. The brown paper grocery bag is crumpled and tossed to a wastebasket. It misses. The audience moans. We’re with him. Bill puts on a peaked party hat, samples the punch, and looks at his watch. Leaning against a wall, he tries unsuccessfully to be casual.

The hero is average height. He has a paper mache head with mustache, bushy eyebrows and an open-mouthed smile. His checked shirt slightly bulges with a pot belly making the character more human and familiar. Manipulated by two puppeteers in black, articulate arms and hands are loaned one by each puppeteer. The doorbell rings. Someone has left a package. Its tag says from Mom. He shakes the card, no check falls out.

Andy Manjuck and Dorothy James

Coordination is seamless. Sitting in an armchair (on a puppeteer’s lap), infectious dancing, getting Charlie-Chaplin-like tangled in recording tape and an extra long phone cord are drolly handled. Time passes. Bill is discouraged but determined to be festive. He invents ways to do this anthropomorphizing objects into party guests. These come to life. Some are malevolent. Other,different versions of himself manifest. What starts as light comedy becomes first pathos, then dark and fantastic, and, at last, festive. We’re invited to the party. Grins are prevalent.

Andy Manuck and Bill

The piece is charming and imaginative. Grand for puppet fans, theater fans, and those who just want to let in a bit of fresh air.

Photos by Richard Termine

HERE’s Dream Music Puppetry presents
Bill’s 44th
Created by Dorothy James & Andy Manjuck of Official Puppet Business
Puppeteers: Andy Manjuck, Dorothy James, & Jon Riddleberger
Creative Collaborator: Jon Riddleberger
Composer: Eamon Fogarty
Puppet Design: Dorothy James

Through July 28, 2024

HERE
145 Sixth Ave

About Alix Cohen (1850 Articles)
Alix Cohen is the recipient of ten New York Press Club Awards for work published on this venue. Her writing history began with poetry, segued into lyrics and took a commercial detour while holding executive positions in product development, merchandising, and design. A cultural sponge, she now turns her diverse personal and professional background to authoring pieces about culture/the arts with particular interest in artists/performers and entrepreneurs. Theater, music, art/design are lifelong areas of study and passion. She is a voting member of Drama Desk and Drama League. Alix’s professional experience in women’s fashion fuels writing in that area. Besides Woman Around Town, the journalist writes for Cabaret Scenes, Broadway World, TheaterLife, and Theater Pizzazz. Additional pieces have been published by The New York Post, The National Observer’s Playground Magazine, Pasadena Magazine, Times Square Chronicles, and ifashionnetwork. She lives in Manhattan. Of course.

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