Mock Turtle Productions

Mock Turtle is a 501(c)(3) theater company engaged in producing original plays and collaborative work through the art of puppetry. Our principal interest is in developing new and meaningful ways of integrating puppetry with other theatrical forms. The projects shown here exemplify our work with theater and community organizations. 

Mock Turtle has produced more than thirty original pieces for the puppet theater since its first show in 1978.  This nearly annual production a new works has always kept the company vital and creative.  The learning curve continues as we engage in larger productions requiring bigger casts and rehearsal time.  Increasingly, these productions have called for the full engagement of other artists and performers.  Our show, The Museum of Music, created in partnership with the Pennsylvania Sinfonia, engages an ensemble of six professional musicians.  The Morningtime of Now, a production based on the diary of Opal Whitely, was created in a full partnership with national folk artist, Anne Hills.  Featured here is our most recent piece for combining stage acting and puppetry, The Secret. 

The Secret

Our production of The Secret was by far our most ambitious original play.  It is also our most collaborative piece involving some ten local cultural organizations and more than a dozen artists and performers.  This level of community involvement in the production was, of course, a part of the play concept itself.  We were not only creating a play with The Secret, we were creating a community initiative as we celebrated the life and work of our native Bethlehem poet and feminist writer, Hilda Doolittle.   In addition, The Secret, which was selected as the best play of 2019 by the Lehigh Valley Press, was accompanied by panel discussions that ranged from gender issues, to native plants, to lectures on religious life in eighteenth century Bethlehem.  

Process: Original Theater Productions in Puppetry

Throughout the long run of Mock Turtle productions, almost every show began with a purpose beyond purely artistic concerns.  Diversity, feminism, history and environmentalism are some of the mission-driven themes that underlie Mock Turtle plays.  In short, every play begins with our audience and our community, and the issues and concerns that make for a better world.

In the best of times our social themes have been met with worthy script and often effective puppets.  From that point on, the play belongs to the puppeteers.

Goals and Outcomes

The first goal of our plays, whether the were made for children or adults, is audience immersion.  Among their greatest strengths, puppets have the ability to captivate the human mind and enter into mythic space.  A great puppet show is not about the laughs, it is about the joining together of a full audience of people in one place at one time as if it was the only place on Earth.  If the play accomplishes a level of immersion, hopefully the meaning of the play will succeed as well!