A racy Jackie Collins novel. A Swedish experimental theatre company who build their own puppets. Barbie dolls and a continuous shot camera. What’s not to like?
One of the double bill of shows that make up the soft opening for a (gorgeous) freshly renovated The Yard Theatre opening, Malmo Dockteater’s The World Is Full of Married Men adapts puppets from Barbie dolls to stage the Jackie Collins novel in a 2+ hour adaptation. The puppets are all performed by 2 brilliant actors who voice all of the primary and secondary characters, mainly in puppet form but at times themselves in front of a green screen, to great hilarity. There’s something so absurd about the premise that as I describe it, it sounds like it shouldn’t work theatrically, and yet it does. The many locations exist in tiny diorama-like boxes that the puppets live in, magnified by the camera person to a larger screen above the stage, where the English surtitles sit, too.
There’s a lovely undermining of the story through this medium, calling into question so called “serious” moments yet creating empathy when the characters experience real traumatic events. The sharp turns like this are exquisite, undermining expectation again and again.
Absolutely worth catching more of Malmo Dockteater’s work if you can.