The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1934-07-10
FLASHES and
CLOSE-UPS
By LENS
BY LENS
I HAVE been studying the problem
of filming the puppet.

of filming the puppet.
Here is a medium which in itself
is adaptable to the most devastat-
ing social and political satire. I'm
fortunately, the only example Of
this art which we have seen used
in America for the purposes of
revolutionary satire has been the
work of Maud and Golfer, the So
called "Modicots." These have been
in Yiddish with the additional lin1i-
tation of very meager repertory
having the more obviously daffy as
poets of religious ritual as its tar
gets. But despite the obviously cir
cumscribed efforts of this duet, any,
one who has seen their factors"
perform will agree that here is a
front" that has been sadly ne
elected in our cultural movement.
There is not an illusion that these
little plastic wooden dolls cannot
shatter with a few words and
twist of the head. There is not
mouldy convention they cannot
make appear in all its fraudulence.
There is not bourgeois idea
whether it emanates from the Brain
Trust or the Daily News-which
they cannot in a flash reduce to
its essentially absurd skeleton. In
brief, the puppet contains all the
necessary elements that can make
of it broad and popular medium
of political satire
1t is by no means a simple wea-
pom to use, as may be imagined by
many who have watched these lit
tie people" shift and dance around
on a miniature stage. The highest
skill of the caricaturist, the painter
the writer and the mimic play
part in the production Of really
effective puppet show. Conrade
Louis Bunin, one Of Americas most
talented technicians and artists of
both the puppet and marionnete, is
in every sense of the word Gre
ator fully as equipped in his own
field as some Of our important revo-
lutionary artists in the fields Of the
literary, graphic and plastic arts.
We emphasize this fact because the
attitude that puppets are a minor
branch Of our revolutionary cul-
tural work requiring no concen-
trated study and application is ut
terly false. I, at any rate, am con-
WINGED that here is an untapped
mine that must be tackled in all
seriousness.
By next fall New York will wit
ness the Inauguration of the first
revolutionary stationary puppet and
marionnette theatre in America I'M
der the direction of Joseph Golfer
and Louis Bunin. Watch the
ascendancy of bright new star in
the armament of our revolutionary
cultural movement.
7 STARTED by saying that 7 have
1 been looking into the possibilities
of making films with puppets
The puppets basic weakness is its
small size. This size is condition
made necessary by the fact that
the human hand is its hover In the
marionnette, attempts have been
made to increase the size to as
much as five feet in height (Pic-
collD. With puppets the problem is
almost insuperable and can only be
solved by the intervention of an
other medium And what can that
medium be but the movie which
can turn ants into gigantic mon
sters and three-inch models into
skyscraping structures? (The cine
ma is the great magician which can
toy with time, space, etc.
Also through the film elements
can be introduced into the puppet
show which will broaden its scope
a thousandfold.
There are obstacles to be over
come, too, of course A closeup of
a puppets head will have to be ac-
companied by proportionate in
crease in volume of the sound it
utters, for instance.
Color, which plays such an i'm
pOTIanC parG III puppeCry, Will nave
to find its equivalent values in
Photographic monotone.
But when these difficulties are
overcome, and in theory they have
already been overcome, I'm conf
dent that this proposed wedding of
the film and the puppet will have
been proven a success and val
liable addition to the arsenal of
Ant,titnr. t-o.rol11tin.nor1r cilltl1rn