The Monster's Birthday Party

Dracula greets guests to The Monster's Birthday Party.

The Monster's Birthday Party is a short film by Phillip Einfeld that's in the same vein as Spook House Dave and Transylvania TV (me thinks me does detect a trend here). The puppetry in it is sometimes a little stiff, but the level of detail and work that went in to this film is really, really impressive. I hadn't seen Phillip's work before so this was a nice treat. The film is available to watch on YouTube in two parts, here and here.

TV Puppetry Workshop in Sydney

Puppeteer Gary Friedman teaches TV puppetry workshops this spring in Sydney, Australia.

Gary Friedman is once again teaching workshops in film & TV style puppetry in Sydney, Australia. The course runs from mid-April to early June 2008 and is "suitable for film makers, puppeteers, performers, and others interested in learning about how puppetry is made for the screen." Participants will learn how to build their own puppets and how to develop, perform and direct their short scenes on camera. Gary has uploaded a short video to YouTube with information about the course and if you're interested in enrolling you can email Gary directly at info@puppetrynews.com.

John Howard's Final Scapegoat Search

Australian puppeteer Shan Jayaweera has posted the final installment of his John Howard puppet video blog.

I'm not exactly timely posting this, but I wanted to mention that in a victory for left-leaning voters Down Under and friends of the environment everywhere, John Howard's Liberal government was defeated in Australia over the weekend. Fittingly enough just a few days before Shan Jayaweera posted his final installment of John Howard: Search For A Scapegoat (see previous post).

Oh and just an aside, but if anyone wants to start an anti-Stephen Harper video blog before the next Canadian election I will so help out. Climate change deniers (or apologists) like Howard, Harper and Bush are a serious threat to our species' survival and the fewer of them we have leading the Western nations of the world, the better.

Funky Dancing Marionette

A dancing marionette gets down to Stevie Wonder's I Wish.

This is a nifty video of a dancing marionette. It was shot as a demo/experiment in puppet manipulation by Shan Jayaweera, previously mentioned here for his YouTube video spoofs of Australian Prime Minister John Howard.

Shan found this particular marionette on ebay, but these types of puppets are pretty common. If you'd like to own one yourself, The Lighter Side makes a very similar Flamingo Marionette that's just $19.95 US.

John Howard: Searching For A Scapegoat

Puppetry and politics collide once again on YouTube with John Howard: Search For A Scapegoat.

John Howard: Search For A Scapegoat is the latest in a series of political puppetry satires from Shan Jayaweera that take aim at the Australian Prime Minister. It's an election year down under and in Shan's newest videos John Howard's puppet alter ego searches for "someone new to blame and (use to) scare the voters into voting for him". Two episodes are available so far; you can check them out on YouTube here and here.

Via Spirits Dancing.

Lines on Palms

Toy Theatre inspires Lines on Palms, the latest Josh Pyke music video.

Lines on Palms is the video for a recent single from Australian singer Josh Pyke. It's filled with lots of simple, but very effective puppetry. The whole video looks like it takes place in a wonderfully whimsical giant toy theatre.

Thanks to Mike Marinos for the great link!

How To Make A Beat

A puppet explains how to make music in How To Make A Beat.

I'm not really musically inclined whatsoever and so I actually learned something watching How To Make A Beat, a clever little short film in which a puppet explains how to create music. It's by an Australian company called Isore Productions and sort of a modern spin on an old Muppet routine called Visual Thinking; you can watch a clip on YouTube here).

Thanks to Jabberwockie for the great link!

More film/video puppetry workshops in Sydney

Gary Friedman and the Sydney Film School are gearing up for more puppetry for film and television courses in 2006 (see also this previous post).

Click here for more info.