Santa's children

Jul med Prøysen og Snekker Andersen* (Christmas with Prøysen and Carpenter Andersen) has become a classic at Oslo Nye Teater (Oslo New Theatre)'s puppet theatre. It has been performed near annually, most recently the Christmas of 2019. This will likely not be the last time for it. After the death of Christian Egemar, Per Horn took over the responsibility for the stage design, and developed it.

Stein Kiran was employed as a puppeteer at Oslo Nye Teater (Oslo New Theatre) in 1984, at the same time as Per Skjølsvik. Kiran took over the artistic responsibility for the theatre's puppet theatre in 1994.

Sceneweb refers to the other puppets registered from the production. These are Carpenter Andersen, Santa's wife and the mouse mother with children.

SOURCES:

Oslo Nye Teater (Oslo New Theatre).

Helgesen, Anne M.: Animasjonen - Figurteatrets velsignelse og forbannelse. Norsk Figurteaterhistorie (literally: Animation - The blessing and curse of puppetry. Norwegian Puppetry History). Dr. Art. thesis in theatre theory, 2003, UiO. 

Donated by: Oslo Nye Teater (Oslo New Theatre).

Transported 27.05.2020.

*Not yet translated into the English. The title within parentheses is the Norwegian title's literal meaning.

The heads of Santa's children were cut from Styrofoam and fortified with cotton gauze and glue. After this, the faces were painted. The clothes were made from cotton fabric. These puppets had small pockets fastened to the soles of their feet, where the puppeteers could place their fingers to move them.

Santa's children were all made from the same template, a simple construction. Through their heads went rounded rods with a prolongation the puppeteer could hold on to. The arms hung loose and followed the puppets' movements. Beneath the soles of the feet, Santa's children had small pockets fastened, so that the puppeteer could move them. The body of the child in the middle is fastened to a rod long enough to lift him high enough to walk on stilts.

In an interview, Stein Kiran stated the following: "As the new artistic director at Oslo Nye Teater (Oslo New Theatre)'s puppet theatre, I see no reason to change our choice of repertoire significantly. A mix of old and new is right, in my opinion. As a nationally and municipally supported theatre, we should consider what the audiences want, and not just what we want. Of course, we are also to think anew, play new drama and be innovative, which I think we have made over the recent years." (A. M. Helgesen, 2003: 374).