Synopsis

WONDERFUL

Vishang Shah






“Thaumazein, the act of wondering. The “phenomena” that we see must provoke our wonderment if we are to start looking behind appearances to one day have a chance of beginning our journey toward light.”

--- Plato, Allegory of the Cave







Facts

Puppets were commonly known in Athens in 421 BC.

Atheneos reproaches the people of Athens because they handed over the theatre of Dionysus to the puppets of Potheinos and took more delight in these than in the plays of Euripides.

Greek neurospasta and the Roman sigillario are normally translated into English as “puppets” or into French as “marionettes”, and neurospaston as “puppeteer”.

In India, the word sutradhar refers to the show manager of theatrical performances (or a puppet player), and also means literally “string puller” or “string holder”, exactly as does the Greek word neurospasta, which cannot be merely a coincidence.

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435 BC, Athens

Euripides was a Greek Poet and Playwright. Plays of Euripides were greatly popular in Athens because of its satire quality. As the first of the “realists”, he brought realism in cloths, conversation and character to the Greek stage. He was a pioneer in tragic-comedy. In 441 BC, he was awarded for his works and contributions.

One day, a man named Potheinos arrived in Athens with a big trunk. He looked like an ordinary man who might have came in search of work. He was a puppet player. Potheinos arrived with a dream. Dream to show his puppet actors move, and tell human stories. Dream to show his puppet shows in the Great Theatre of Dionysus.

But the people of Athens considered him as “fool”. The audience was used to see play from human actors and wooden puppets of Potheinos were looked like carved pieces of wooden boxes jumping here and there.

Potheinos was desperate to refine his work and the new art form. He tried new techniques of staging and puppets moving. He also made new colorful costumes and ornaments for the puppets to make them look more human. But no idea worked. His puppets still looked lifeless and the plays less believable.

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Then one day he decided to enter the theatre at the time when rehearsal was going on a play by Euripides. He looked at the Euripides, who was teaching actors the methods of acting and how to carry out emotions.
Seeing it discouraged Potheinos and he considered that his puppets are lifeless. He was not able to order them to carry out certain emotion by making a move or expression. When he headed for the exit of theatre he found one little girl watching the rehearsals.

When he reached near her, she told him: “you are not looking behind appearances.”

He stopped there and asked her what she meant by it. She told him that she knew him and his puppet show. She even told him the reason he had came inside theatre. Potheinos was amazed by her and asked how she knew all that. Then she told him that the important thing to know is how he is going to make his puppets move like the actors of Euripides.

Potheinos told her that it’s impossible to do what actors do with wooden puppets.

Then the little girl taught Potheinos that to make people believe in his play and stories he must look behind appearances of human plays, that is the creator of the plays.

She told him that while looking at the puppets with the strings, audience is directly looking inside the “string puller”. As in the case of plays by Euripides, audience is watching what Euripides created and designed. In the play audience is not watching an actor but the performance of that actor which originated from insides of Euripides.

So first he has to believe in his creations in order for audience to believe it.

Then the little girl gave Potheinos a vision. In that vision, when Potheinos looked, Euripides was holding an array of strings in his both hands. The ends of those strings were attached to each actor and he was commanding them with the strings.
They were moving like puppets (stiff) on the command of Euripides but still looked convincing and real when viewed as a whole performance.


Then Potheinos realized the true meaning of story telling. When he turned to the little girl to thank her, she was disappeared and one wooden puppet was there in her place.

He took that puppet and walked out of the door.

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After 1 month, Potheinos put a stage in that marketplace of Athens and started the puppet show without any audience. People passed by and laughed at him. But he didn’t care for it and continued with the performance. At one point one boy stopped to see a little puppet do some mischief. Then a man stopped as he say one puppet caring for family. Just as same, one by one people stopped and found something identical in the puppets with their lives.

And Potheinos was having audience for his puppet shows.



After some time Potheinos entered the theatre of Dionysus to entertain people of Athens through his Puppet Show.

And the audience marked his performance “Wonderful”.