KABC-TV Eyewitness News -Search For The Missing Carrot Top Puppet From "Lili" Reported by George Pennacchio
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KABC-TV Eyewitness News -Search For The Missing Carrot Top Puppet From "Lili" Reported by George Pennacchio |
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The First Santa Monica Puppetry Festival October 8-12, 2008
How It Happened
By Steve Meltzer from the Puppetry Journal Fall, 2008
I had finally re-opened the Santa Monica Puppetry Center last year (Puppetry Journal Winter 2007) and during my struggles with the beaurocracy I made a lot of new friends. One of them was the manager for the Miles Playhouse, a very old and beautiful city-owned theater. Justin told me he always wanted a puppet festival and that set me to thinking about how to make something really special and historic. I’m from 1953 and so is the MGM classic film “Lili” and I began to ponder how to involve Leslie Caron. The star of this puppet themed masterpiece is now in her 70’s and the Google told me she was happily living in her homeland, France. She owns a hotel in Burgundy and remains active in film and television. It was in the middle of the night when I hit the send button on an email that I expected would be read by the concierge at her hotel. To my amazement, in a few hours I had a reply from Ms. Caron herself, wanting to know more. I contacted the American Cinematheque, an organization devoted to screenings, and proposed a collaboration. They, in turn, contacted the Motion Picture Academy and the French Consul General while I contacted Leslie’s agent who turned out to be someone I knew. Looking back, I am amazed that in a short time we all worked together on a plan to bring Leslie to America for what she later described as four days in paradise. I’m glad she could see it that way because she had a hectic schedule. On Friday night 1200 people would attend a 50th anniversary screening of “Gigi” followed by Q & A with Leslie at the Motion Picture Academy. On Saturday she was part of a live show, ‘A Celebration of Puppetry’, on Sunday it was a screening of ‘Lili’ followed by Q & A with Leonard Maltin and on Monday, a reception in her honor given by the French Consulate General. We assembled a performance-based schedule around these events. The wonderful slate of artists included Phillip Huber, Bob Baker, Rene, Tony Urbano, Mallory Lewis, Doug Seymour, Dan Horn and Leslie Gray. A screening of the rarely seen “I Am Suzanne” with the Yale Puppeteers and a tribute to Paul Winchell featuring an appearance by Winchell’s assistant puppeteer, Jay Lloyd rounded out the festival schedule. Support and encouragement came from The Los Angeles Guild of Puppetry and the International Puppetry Museum. The pivotal event was to be the Saturday night show, with performances by Bob Baker, Rene, Tony Urbano, Mallory Lewis, and Dan Horn. Everyone was anticipating Leslie Caron’s reunion with her puppet co-stars. Paul Walton and Michael O’Rourke, an astounding marionette team who were active from 1931 to 1966, created these four hand puppets. Three of them are owned by Alan Cook (International Puppetry Museum) and have been widely exhibited through the years, but the main character, Carrot Top has been missing. Adding to the confusion is the fact that there were two sets of puppets made and a marionette version of the character was featured in the Walton and O’Rourke stage act after “Lili” was released. After some research and old fashioned digging (Big thanks to Mary Decker here.) we located the Carrot Top Marionette, now retired and staying with Michael O’Rourke’s grand daughter. Her daughter, Amie, brought Carrot Top to life for the Saturday night show- a rare treat to have Carrot Top and Lili together again. (More big thanks to Doug Preis for recreating Carrot Top’s voice.) The evening ended with an audience sing along of the Oscar winning ‘Hi Lili- Hi Lo’. The festival had many unexpected highlights including a visit from TV personality, Chuck McCann, who brought along two of Paul Ashley’s incredible hand puppets. Charles Taylor surprised everyone at the ‘I Am Suzanne’ screening by bringing one of the original marionettes from the 1934 film. The hunt for the Carrot Top hand puppet continues and we had some great publicity to help widen the search. Plans for next year’s festival are underway and this experience gave me more insight into how such event should be staged. So many people contributed their talent and effort that I could write a separate article on how wonderfully strong our puppet community has become. When asked for recollections of the puppeteers, Ms. Caron replied, “I hate to say this but I was never aware of them. I was solely aware of the puppets themselves.” Walton and O’Rourke and the other puppeteers, George Latshaw and Wolo would have to smile- knowing that anonymity is a testament to their genius.
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