photo by Mark Dannenhauer
The Bread & Puppet Theater: The Circus of the Possibilitarians
Cambridge Common, Cambridge MA (Mass. Ave & Garden St., near Harvard Square)
Sunday, September 2nd, 3pm – FREE! (rain or shine)
to kick off Harvard Square’s annual “Revival Month”
Sponsored by the Cambridge Arts Council and the Harvard Square Business Association
What better way to celebrate (and ridicule) the Ridiculous Neverending Circus of this political campaign year with that esteemed bastion of progressive thought, The Bread and Puppet Theater!
Puppets by the people, for the people! Coming up on their 50th Anniversary (WOW!), this award-winning theatrical troupe return to one of their old haunts, Cambridge Common, to usher in Harvard Square’s Revival Month. I’ll let the Bread & Puppet people attempt to explain what they will be doing on Sunday:
“The Circus of the Possibilitarians is a satirical horse and butterfly circus, addressing pertinent national and international issues in a clownish fashion, features rotten ideas, a wild dancing horse, a saxophone ballet, a solemn salute to the world’s casualties and much more! Not to mention The Dire Circumstance Jubilation Ensemble providing a little bit of brass and a lot of noise. Please take note that if some of the circus acts are politically puzzling to adults, accompanying children can usually explain them.”
As is their tradition, the audience will be invited to check out the masks and puppets up-close after the performance, and their Cheap Art will be for sale. Expect a wild afternoon of pomp and hilarity. For a little taste, see below (thanks to ‘beverlyills’ for uploading this gem).
The Bread & Puppet Theater had its humble beginnings on the Lower East Side of New York City, founded by artist-dancer Peter Schumann. At the height of their powers during the Vietnam War protests, they’ve performed in parades and demonstrations, and at marches, fairs and festivals around the world. Good, clean, subversive family entertainment with heady political and social commentary, giant paper maché puppets, and a raucous brass band, they now reside in the bucolic hills of Vermont. Oh yeah, and they share their (homemade) bread at many of their performances as a symbolic gesture of the importance of community… hence, their name.
Bread & Puppet is one of the oldest, nonprofit, self-supporting theatrical companies in this country. www.breadandpuppet.org.
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