Jennie Marino

Nomadic Puppeteers

Success of the hunter-gatherers 

Having built the Audrey II puppets at the intimate Elmwood Playhouse in Nyack, we never conceived that the largest of the pods might not fit through the double doors on strike day. Oopsies.

With a little surgery and creative engineering, to the pod – not the doors – we managed to free her, but then realized we didn’t have enough clean rope on hand to secure the vegetable to the roof of the old station wagon.

I only lived 6 blocks away from the theatre, so the indigenous crew hoisted Audrey up and marched forth up Main Street. Of course, in Nyack, nobody blinked an eye.

This particular set of puppets continued to work for many years throughout the tri-state before being sold to a rental house. I later built 2 more sets of Audreys for the official license holder before retiring from the “Pod Squad”.

Being involved in a good production of Little Shop is an experience not to be missed.  Audrey II will forever hold a huge piece of my heart, as well as a few drops of my blood.