For Carolyn Koerber, puppetry is a living, breathing performance art that embodies excitement, audience interaction, and energy. That’s why instead of finding her hidden behind a cloth or stage frame, audiences see her as part of the show, front and center with the puppets.
For the last time, the First Night State College audience will have the opportunity to experience Koerber’s unique and engaging puppetry style during her final performance at the New Year’s Eve celebration.
Koerber’s The Puppet Factory will have three performances of The Talking Stone during First Night. The performances are at 1, 3, and 5 p.m. at the Days Inn Penn State.
As a self-taught puppeteer, Koerber says her love of puppetry stems from her love of theater and started almost by accident.
After graduating from college in 1966, she taught high school for a few years. During this time, she became involved in as many theater projects as she could. She participated in community theater in Baltimore, Maryland, worked with the Baltimore City Department of Parks and Recreation as a theater specialist, taught creative drama, worked with Maryland Public Television, and acted in summer stock and children’s theater. While working with an experimental theater group at a university, she had the idea to put on a puppet show for some of the graduate students’ children. After a great performance, other local community groups began asking the theater group to perform and host puppet workshops.
By 1979, Koerber’s interest in puppetry had grown large enough for her to decide to actively pursue it. With limited available roles in “people theater” and a natural talent for developing character voices, she knew puppetry was her calling — a calling that requires much more than simply performing.
“Puppetry is a very complex art form. I came to it as a performer, but I quickly found out that this art form I’d chosen requires skills in writing, puppet-making, set design and creation, sound effects, scene building, and, oh yes, performing!” she says.
She initially began performing she hide behind the stage, but she says something about it just didn’t feel right. To continue to improve her shows, she developed and adapted her style of performing through the years. She transitioned to performing directly in front of the audience with a hood over her face and neck, but something was still missing.
She realized in order to elicit the responses she was looking for from her audiences, in order to be an interwoven part of the performance, she needed to be a visible part of the show. She says that sense of connection to the audience helps her perform at her best.
“I’m sharing the experience with them. It allows me to really be more aware of the audience and see how they are reacting,” she says. “It is very important to me to have that energy go back and forth between the audience and me.”
Throughout the years, more and more audience members have told Koerber that they have experienced this European-style of puppetry and love seeing the puppeteer interact as part of the performance. Even those that have never seen this type of show are captivated by her style. Some admit they are astounded at the fact that Koerber actually disappears from the performance for them.
“When I’m not taking focus, when I’m not purposely taking focus, the puppet is alive and I’m not even part of the performance. The audience doesn’t notice me,” she says. “They say, ‘I can’t believe it. I just forgot you were there!’ The reason they forget I am there is because of my ability to focus all my energy on the puppet and what the puppet is doing.”
As a way to help her “disappear,” Koerber developed a performance technique where she wholeheartedly believes the puppet is alive and is the actor. She feels this helps her audiences, especially children, see her as part of the performance and not someone simply controlling the puppets.
“If I believe it, ta-da, they believe it. It is making the puppet even more alive,” she says.
She says that being in front of the audience as an active part of the performance can be very intense and difficult at times, requires a lot more energy but it allows for a more powerful, exciting, and interactive show for all.
“It creates a flow. It can be electric. That doesn’t happen all the time, but when it does, it’s just amazing,” she says.
She knows she has achieved this level of performing when children come up to her after the show and want to share how they feel about her performance. It is then that she knows she truly connected with the audience.
“I love how [puppetry] creates a bond with children — a powerful bond that lets their imaginations soar. I respond to their energy and their honesty,” she says. “They just aren’t ready for it to end.”
While she loves the electricity and excitement she feels from performances, she says that after almost 46 years of performing, the time has come for her to focus on projects closer to her home in Maryland. She will soon begin to phase out performing, spending more time mentoring, conducting workshops and professional development for teachers, and passing on her knowledge to a younger generation of performers and puppeteers.
For her final First Night show, Koerber will bring The Talking Stone, a Native American show to life. She describes it as three stories that were meant to teach Native American children to respect the land and the forces of nature. The Talking Stone was the first show Koerber (Carolyn)ever performed (in 1992) as a solo puppeteer, so she thought it would be appropriate to offer it as her farewell performance in State College.
She says this year’s performance will be a bittersweet experience for her, as she has been a part of First Night for more than 20 years. She loves that the celebration attracts all ages, allowing performers to see excitement and enjoyment in the eyes of children, parents, and grandparents.
“I’ve performed at other First Nights. But First Night State College is very special — it has a wonderful, gentle quality that the others do not,” she says. “I don’t think they even know it — I don’t think they understand how special they are. This year, I will be moving in slow motion, savoring every single moment. I will carry the memories of it on with me.”
