Co-creators and puppeteers Dorothy James (left) and Andy Manjuck, in Bill’s 44th at HERE. This photograph and banner by Richard Termine.
If you think puppet shows are for kids, think again. Bill’s 44th is a comic puppet play for adults with original recorded music that makes one marvel at the sheer inventiveness of the human imagination. Co-created by Andy Manjuck and Dorothy James, this wordless theater piece invites one to reflect on the inescapable reality of ageing and loneliness.
This show about isolation was penned during the pandemic and had its first run at Dixon Place in New York City in June 2021. Only four performances to small audiences were permitted while simultaneously being live-streamed. It was favorably received by critics and the public alike. Since then, it has toured nationally and internationally, snagging some prestigious awards along the way. Its next stop is a return to the Edinburgh Festival Fringe.
The conceit: It's a non-milestone birthday for Bill. But he’s decided to pull out all the stops. The streamers are hung, the punch spiked, the cake frosted. But where are his guests? As the anxious host takes a nervous look at his watch, he realizes that he may well be spending his birthday alone.
In the absence of guests, Bill’s imagination goes wild. After all, why be blue on one’s birthday when one can trip the light fantastic with the help of a few surreal friends? To get in the birthday spirit, Bill imbibes a few cups of his triple spiked punch, munches on chips, and samples some of the colorful vegetables on the crudité tray. Whether it’s the booze kicking in, or his natural creativity, he soon finds himself crafting a Lilliputian friend out of a carrot stick by drawing a happy face on it and dubbing it “Cary.” Cary is the first party guest of the evening and looks particularly healthy and full of life sitting in a chair with a party hat on.
James (left), Manjuck, and Jon Riddleberger getting the birthday party started. Photograph by Richard Termine.
Bizarrely, a few scenes later, a life-size version of Cary (manipulated by the excellent Jon Riddleberger) materializes at his door, providing Bill with a dance partner his own size. Bill, as it turns out, has a passion for dancing—and so does Cary. And the subsequent illusion of these two puppets dancing, courtesy of Manjuck and James’s deft puppeteering, is nothing short of amazing.
Bill might not be the most debonair man in town. But he’s immensely likable. He presents with a bald papier-mâché head, Groucho Marx eyebrows and moustache, hollow eye sockets, and a paunchy stomach that his white checkered sweater can’t fully conceal. Even though he strenuously tries to pull his abdomen in at times to achieve a more youthful appearance, he never quite succeeds.
As crucial as the leading man is to the play, Manjuck and James are truly the ones who finesse the theatrical magic. Dressed in nondescript black pants and shirts, these wizards of puppeteering work in complete unison. They seamlessly manipulate Bill, just a head and torso, using their own arms and legs, plus a ton of legerdemain, to bring Bill alive to the audience.
Eamon Fogarty composes each scene with elevator-style music, and a dash of jazz peppered in, as Bill endures an emotional rollercoaster that has summits, troughs, twists, and more. Audiences are taken along on the 55-minute ride through Bill’s adventures and misadventures. If this birthday party gone wrong tickles the audience’s funny bone, it also shows them Bill’s resilience, in the face of absurd situations.
Consider the birthday package from his mother that arrives at his door, which turns out to be a VCR cassette that begs to be watched. But when Bill puts it into his TV’s cassette deck, the cassette tape first jams, then eventually ejects itself, only to entangle him in a Gordian knot of shredded cassette tape. To further complicate matters, Bill’s wall phone starts ringing at the same time, and when he answers it, it falls off the wall, and so forth. It’s a hilarious clown scene that Charlie Chaplin himself would approve of.
Manjuck (left), Riddleberger, and James. Photograph by Tristram Kenton.
There’s also a ballet of balloons at the play’s midpoint that starts out in delight (Bill draws fanciful faces on them) but ends on a dark note (Bill gets locked out of his own home!) when some rogue balloons turn diabolical. Suffice it to say, following this nightmarish episode Bill learns to be more cautious with inanimate objects and his own creative impulses as their ends might not be his own.
Although Bill’s 44th is categorized as a puppet show, it truly transcends its genre with the ingenuity of its co-creators, Manjuck and James. Indeed, it’s a puppet parable that teaches the value of hope in the bleakest and loneliest of times.
The production of Bill’s 44th runs at HERE (145 6th Avenue) through July 28. Evening performances are at 7 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday; matinees are at 2 p.m. Saturday and Sunday. For tickets and more information, visit here.org.
Co-creators: Dorothy James and Andy Manjuck Set: Peter Russo Puppet Design: Dorothy James Lighting: M. Jordan Wiggins Sound: Andy Manjuck Composer: Eamon Fogarty
