Possessed Puppets

We had been invited to a fund raising trivia night at a local school and as it is always themed, we had to come up with something appropriate. The theme was," Once Upon A Time", but in a cracked interpretation of classic fairy tales. Each table of six was given an individual title and ours was -Possessed Puppets- which was a much easier idea than' The Princess and the Pea.'
 This was mentioned to me on the Wednesday before the event on the following Saturday, so I immediately started to create a large puppet for each member of our team.

Sorry about the lack of rotation but this gives a good idea of what I had envisaged, a long, lanky body with a Tim Burton inspired head.

This is the working plan and you can see that it's about 55cm long. Against this I was able to measure  all the various body parts and there were plenty! Six puppets means six different heads, six similar torsos, twelve hands and feet, twelve arms and legs (which would be made of two sections), and assorted clothes etc.

As I said before, the faces were to be Tim burton inspired as I feel he captures the essence of "Possessed" to a tee. Here are the sketches that Google yielded up and I felt quite happy about their suitability.

This is a checklist I started for the six puppets but really all it did was tell me who was going to get what.

Because most of the work went into the limbs, I include this to show how they were made. Newspaper was rolled up, taped at the ends then wrapped in cut and measured pieces of an old sheet I found in my "rags for the use of" bag. Each cylinder was then hand stitched in three places, very quickly and with little heed to neatness (not necessary considering the subject), and a blob of super glue with a bit of kicker added to each stitch. This made the tiresome task of making 36 limb pieces quite easy.

The heads of course make the model and I would have liked to have had six styrofoam balls ( 10cm dia.),  instead of just the two I found. The grinning idiot at the top is one such ball but the cute girl and her toothy mate at the bottom were made by wrapping layers of newsprint around a set of smaller styrofoam balls(5cm). Half way through the vigorous wrapping procedure, the balls were given a good bashing with a small hammer to persuade them to stay spherical and masking tape wrapped around to maintain that shape. Due to the different material, these paper heads became quite heavy compared to the foam ones. This caused a definite 'sagging from the neck' problem which necessitated the insertion of skewer sticks into the heads and thence into the tops of the torsos - not as easy as it sounds.
Once the ball was made it was shoved into a sock (we have a wonderful second hand clothes shop in our little town) and then coated with thinned PVA glue before  hanging in the sun.
Now that could have been a real problem as the town isn't known for its sunny days, but we do live in the tropics so when the sun does shine, it is very hot! They all dried off well.

I wanted to make as many parts of the puppets the same, mainly due to the time constraints on the project but also as a unifying detail overall. Thick cardboard was used to make the hands and feet but it was quite soft and porous. This is where that wonderful stuff Super Glue comes into its own. It is great for sealing and strengthening materials like this cardboard. Here is a hand being dunked into a puddle of glue, then being hung in a row to drip and dry.

This shows a nearly complete puppet and his mate the Red Devil. Their torsos are fabric tubes from socks, stuffed with plastic bags (they are much softer than scrunched newspaper), which were sewn and turned over at the tops to tighten them up.
The legs and arms were sewn roughly but securely and each stitching joint was treated with super glue as per the limbs.

This puppet became everybody's favourite as it couldn't be placed anywhere without displaying a whole lot of attitude. I made the hair by stretching a small black sock over the back of her head, tying it off tightly with a rubber band, stitching the front down at three places and coming up with a cute widow's peak.
She was out there and away!

While making the group, I thought I would like to have at least one token zombie but that meant two different sized protuberant eyes and a gaping mouth - could it be done?
The eyes are half a table tennis ball and a section of a spare small styro ball. I tried to glue them overnight with PVA held in place with tape, but the larger one didn't stick, so back to the super glue. This had a bit of an eating effect on the foam but it held it in place that's all that mattered.
Once the eyes were in place I cut into the sock and newspaper to make the mouth. The problems I thought I would have didn't occur and I was able to carve out a sizeable mouth. This was sealed with super glue then a layer of Selley's Kneadit was added.
Teeth, made of shaped thick plastic,. were inserted in slots cut into the hard Kneadit with a motor tool.

Apart from a few minor additions, this is the final look of the group. Can you see what I mean about the pony tail girl? Zombie boy, wearing his favourite tie, is up the top with his mate the Red Devil, while Let's Get Physical is on the left gazing down at Gormless (who just doesn't get him - or life), while the original Baron Samedi (he gets a top hat at the last minute) decides to take advantage of his situation and stretches his considerable arms around both girls.

Now just because I started this project, that doesn't mean I did it all. This happy group of Trivia goers spent a lovely evening in front of the TV, stitching on hands, feet and limbs while eating fish and chips and watching Australia beat New Zealand in the Anzac Rugby League test.

See what I mean about Gormless? Staring off into space, totally oblivious to the whole world apart from the fact that she has really cool hair.