"Milly and Tillie" at Open Eye Figure Theatre

A 2013 Ivey Award winner for Overall Excellence returns this summer! Open Eye Figure Theatre's delightfully silly Milly and Tillie is playing at their charmingly intimate space in South Minneapolis through June 25, and then moves to Artistry in Bloomington July 8 through August 13. Like the silliest public television show for kids brought to full and vivid life, sisters Milly and Tillie Silly will delight their guests, the audience, for just under an hour, at which point you will be sad to say good-bye to them. The website says "recommended especially for grade school children and toddlers as well as parents and grandparents!!" I am none of the above, and I still enjoyed watching the Silly sisters, and only slightly less, I enjoyed watching the tiny humans who were completely enraptured by them.

"The Holiday Pageant" at Open Eye Figure Theatre

Continuing with my marathon weekend of holiday shows (read more about that here), last night I saw Open Eye Figure Theatre's Holiday Pageant. Like Black Nativity is to Penumbra Theatre, The Holiday Pageant is Open Eye's annual tradition. And like Black Nativity, I had never seen it before this year. The show began as an entertainment for family and friends in the home of Open Eye Co-Founders Susan Haas and Michael Sommers (who wrote, directed, and designed this version), and has since expanded into the show currently on the charming, intimate, adorably tiny stage of Open Eye. The production values may have increased, with beautiful sets and costumes and a 12-person choir singing original songs by Victor Zupanc, but it still has that homey feel of a family pageant. We're luck that Susan and Michael have invited us into their home and family to experience this oddly sweet little gem.

"The Juniper Tree" at Open Eye Figure Theatre

Open Eye Figure Theater is in its 15th season, but surprisingly, I had not experienced their unique brand of theater until last night. I have been to their charming theater space on 24th Street just off 35W several times for other theater productions, but not to see one of their own shows. It's well past time that I remedy that glaring omission in my Twin Cities theater experience. With their adaptation of the Brothers Grimm fairy tale The Juniper Tree, I see what I've been missing at Open Eye, which "creates original figure theatre, animating the inanimate on an intimate scale." And that is delightful, whimsical, quirky, charming, engaging theater that combines multiple art forms including puppetry and original music to tell a story.

The Juniper Tree is not one of the Grimms' more well-known fairy tales; surprisingly, Disney has yet to make a movie about this stepmother who kills and cooks her stepson, feeds him to his father, and then is killed by a millstone dropped by the boy in bird form (Wikipedia offers a nice plot summary if you'd like to familiarize yourself with the story beforehand). Director/adapter/designer Michael Sommers and the team at Open Eye have taken this dark and disturbing tale (as most fairy tales are before being Disney-ized*) and turned it into something light and sweet and fun, although still with that undercurrent of darkness.

the epitome of
the evil stepmother
(Robert Rosen)

It seems like there are more than just six people on the tiny stage, playing all the characters and manipulating things behind the scenes. It's all perfectly timed and well choreographed, as puppets and humans interact almost like magic. Two of the onstage actors also play in the six-piece orchestra, playing delightfully whimsical original music by Michael Koerner. It's sort of all hands on deck as people smoothly transition from the orchestra to the stage to backstage puppeteering and back again.

the hauntingly lovely
Juniper Tree

I'm no expert on puppets, but these are really beautiful, or scary, or silly, depending on what is called for. There is a puppet of the titular tree, which moves like a living thing in the small stage space behind open doors, creating strikingly beautiful images as smaller versions of some of the characters dance among the branches. An almost lifesize boy and girl puppet interact with the human father (a jolly Julian McFaul) and stepmother (Robert Rosen, so loose and playful with the audience), who are just slightly too big for the charming cottage set with various opening doors and windows, creating an interesting juxtaposition. Puppeteers Liz Schachterle and Justin Spooner bring the girl and boy to life, and also pop up in human form, while Tara Loeper sings hauntingly as the boy's bird spirit.

If you've never experienced the unique wonder that is Open Eye Figure Theatre, The Juniper Tree is a great place to start. Innovative storytelling at its best, using multiple art forms that come together to create something truly unique.



*For another look at how Disney the fairy tales wrong, go see Disenchanted, in which Disney princess tell the real story to hilarious musical effect.