Introduction
This project was made for our 3D Materials class in Art and Design Foundation at George Brown College. We were given the task of making puppets and putting on a show. My partner, Tahera, and I decided to go all out in recreating one of our favourite scenes from Monty Python and the Holy Grail.
Materials
- Felt (and lots of it)
- acrylic paint
- Styrofoam balls
- Red solo cups
- popsicle sticks
- old pillowcases
- pipe cleaners
- googly eyes
- skewers
- Bristol board
- small tupperware
- ribbon
- chain
- spray paint
Workflow
The heads are made of halved styrofoam balls, painted a flesh tone, with googly eyes and felt hair glued on.
Sir Bedevere's helmet was made of a small, halved paper cup with ribbons (his feathers added to the top later).
The coifs were made with stretchy material pulled over the styrofoam heads. To achieve the chainmail pattern, we used mesh from a bag of oranges as a stencil and brushed metallic silver paint on top.
The bodies were made of red solo cups wrapped in grey cotton material. The arms were simple tubes of material attached to the top of the cup (which the head will cover). Popsicle sticks were shoved through the top, allowing puppeteer hands to hold it from inside the cup.
The cup bodies were covered in pillowcase tunics, decorated to match each of the Knights of the Round Table. (Left to right: Sir Robin, Sir Lancelot, King Arthur)
The Frenchmen's tunics were made of shiny napkins with black ribbon.
Finding helmets for the Frenchmen was tricky until we realized that small Tupperware fits quite snuggly around the styrofoam balls. We cut out a part for the face and painted it silver.
Ribbons were tied around every body to keep the tunics from flying around. The puppets that got the most dialogue and screen time were King Arthur and the Taunting Frenchman so their sleeves had chain placed inside for both flexibility and weight. This way, when the hands and arm rods were added, they'd be able to gesture with a bigger range of motion. All other puppets had pipe cleaners put in their sleeves for posing.
Shields made out of Bristol board with pipe cleaners on the back to latch onto the arms
The Knights' flags made of fusible interfacing and skewers.
With all the puppets and props made, all we needed was a castle big enough to fit one of us inside.
The Final Video
Tahera and I had created such an elaborate puppet show that required many more hands to perform than the four we had. Instead of a live performance, we made a video of the scene that is a shot-to-shot recreation of the famous French Taunting scene and we couldn't be prouder of it.
