Current Projects
City Of Hamburgers
Jeffrey is tired of the same old fairy tales and wants to hear about Grandma’s life growing up in the old country. Imagination, as well as ketchup and mustard, flow through this delightfully quirky story. A mouthwatering puppet play for children of all ages performed with live music, dancing hamburgers, and great relish!
Upcoming Performances of City of Hamburgers
Sunday, 11/14/10 at the Connecticut Children’s Book Fair in Rome Commons Ballroom at the University of Connecticut in Storrs. 4 FREE performances, showtimes TBD.
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More about this project…
Alphabet Arts’ puppet play is based on City of Hamburgers (Inkwater Press, 2008), a children’s book by author Mike Reiss (The Simpsons, Ice Age) and illustrator Xeth Feinberg (Mishmash Media). In City of Hamburgers, a German-born grandmother tells her US-born grandson a story about growing up as a “Hamburger,” marrying a Frankfurter, and later becoming an American. This short (approx. 20 minutes), funny and entertaining play makes timely social issues such as tolerance/acceptance of differences, multicultural diversity, immigration and “becoming American” accessible to young audiences while also modeling the importance of oral history and intergenerational storytelling. Inkwater Press recently interviewed us about our adaptation. Read the interview here, and Inkwater’s press release here.
Future plans
Alphabet Arts will continue to tour City of Hamburgers to kid-friendly venues in the future, and to provide post-show hands-on workshops in which our young audience members will create “puppet poems” connecting their own stories/words/designs to themes in the play. Youth will have the opportunity to perform their pieces on our puppet stage at the end of the workshop. We are also in the process of creating an original, full-length piece for adult audiences blending poetry and puppetry that is currently in early stages of development. See Toy Poets Theater below for more details regarding early incarnations of this project. For information on (and pictures of) our past performances of City of Hamburgers, go to our Past Projects page.
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Make A Splash! Summer Reading Program Celebration
Alphabet Arts is thrilled to welcome Kali Therrien and Mandy Weiss to its family of talented artists. Kali and Mandy recently presented their shadow puppet show, The Giant Squid and the Seagull, as well as some other fun and surprises, at the BPL Flatbush branch on Wednesday, 8/18 at 2pm to help the kids celebrate their accomplishments in Brooklyn Public Library’s Summer Reading Program.
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Alphabet Arts presents The Giant Squid and the Seagull
A shadow puppet show by Kali Therrien & Mandy Weiss based on the children’s book by Sgott Mackenzie. Hand puppetry lessons, a sing-along, and other fun surprises with Kali and Mandy follow the show.
Wednesday, 8/18 at 2pm. Flatbush Branch, Brooklyn Public Library, 22 Linden Blvd. btwn. Bedford and Flatbush
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Toy Poets Theater
Amber West and Jennifer Holley will present excerpts from Toy Poets Theater and discuss the project on a panel entitled “New Directions in the Humanities” at UMass Amherst’s Crossroads Conference 2010. Our presentation is Saturday, 10/9/10 from 2:45-5pm in Herter Hall Room 301. The conference is free and open to the public.
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Alphabet Arts’ Co-Founder Amber West performed “Tiffany,” one of the pieces from Toy Poets Theater, and discussed the project at a conference entitled Contemporary Women’s Writing: New Texts, Approaches, and Technologies in San Diego, July 7-9, 2010. West organized and chaired the panel, entitled “Fourth Way: Young Women Taking Hybrid Poetics Beyond the Page,” presenting alongside poet/visual artist Bianca Stone and poet/musician Annie Bacon.
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Alphabet Arts performed in Great Small Works‘ 9th International Toy Theater Festival at St. Ann’s Warehouse in Brooklyn on Wed 6/2/10 and Thurs 6/3/10 at 10pm. Our performance, collectively titled Toy Poets Theater, was made up of 4 toy theaters based on original poems by participating poets. Designed and presented by Amber West, Kirsten Kammermeyer, Jennifer Holley, Bianca Stone and Simone Kearney with original music/sound by Chris Borchardt and Jen Orlando. Read more about Toy Poets Theater here. For pictures from our performances, see our Facebook photo album here.
Our toy theaters remained on display in the Temporary Toy Theater Museum at St. Ann’s for the remainder of this amazing festival, which closed 6/13/10.
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Toy Poets Theater is an ongoing project that we are currently evolving to perform in other venues. Poets, puppeteers and others interested in exploring the relationship between poetry and puppetry should contact us to get involved!
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