Monkey!

This weekend Little Owl and I had a fantastic treat. We drove out to a nearby village and crammed into the pretty hall to see a puppet show version of the Chinese folk tale Monkey. This was an adaptation of the tale written by the wonderful children’s author and previous Children’s Laureate, Michael Rosen. For those of you who don’t know, Monkey is a cheeky and mischievous character who journeys to seek enlightenment. He gets into all sorts of scrapes and makes quite a name for himself. In the end he becomes so cheeky and boastful (wanting to take the place of the Jade Emperor no less!) that Buddha traps him in a mountain for 500 years.

The show was absolutely fantastic and Little Owl was spellbound throughout. Monkey is such a naughty character, even weeing on the front row at one point. This delighted all the kids especially as we’re pretty sure it was only water really. The puppets were so expressive and the set design simple but brilliantly effective. Little Owl could hardly contain herself during Monkey’s battle with a fire-breathing dragon! The show was put on by puppet troupe PuppetCraft, with support from Villages in Action. Villages in Action are a brilliant charity, working throughout Devon to bring high quality professional shows to community venues to improve access to the arts amongst rural communities. PuppetCraft are performing Monkey at venues across the country over the next few months so if you have opportunity do go along and see it. In the mean time we’ll be singing Monkey’s theme tune for days to come…