“Avenue Q” is no more, the Bil Baird Marionette Theater died decades ago, but there is plenty of puppetry in New York, as I detail in my article for TDF Stages, 5 Theatres You Need to Know: Puppet Theaters in New York City.
Below are photographs from some recent productions at those five — Swedish Cottage Marionette Theater in Central Park and Puppetworks in Park Slope, both for children; and three puppet festivals in avant-garde venues: St. Ann’s Warehouse’s Labapalooza, La MaMa Puppet Festival, and HERE’s Dream Music Puppetry.
It needs be said that New York is a center of the puppetry arts and I could easily feature another five, such as Dixon Place’s Puppet Blok and Shadowbox Theater. The New Victory Theater and Lincoln Center Kids often present puppet productions. And then there are the puppets that pop up as co-stars to human actors, including on Broadway — certainly The Lion King, also Frozen., Beetlejuice, and, the biggest of them all, King Kong. To keep up on puppets, sign up for the Jim Henson Foundation’s Puppet Happenings email list .
Check out some of my past puppet pieces.
