Mark Down has been bringing puppets to life for over 20 years. His theatre company, Blind Summit, has tackled topics such as alcoholism, existentialism and even the paranormal. This year, alongside Father Ted’s Ben Keaton, the puppets are going to discuss sex. In a bid to make talking about sex more normal and less of a taboo, The Sex Lives of Puppets challenges societal norms in a safe – and hilarious – way. The Sex Lives of Puppets will be performed at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe this August.
Tell us about The Sex Lives of Puppets
Where to start? Yes puppets have sex, yes they like it, and yes they like talking about it. And that’s the show. It’s puppets talking about sex. The show is made up of a series of monologues and dialogues inspired by the National Survey of Sexual Attitudes and Lifestyles (NATSAL). The puppets talk to the audience in a sort of interview “verbatim” style. It’s funny, rude, sometimes shocking and mostly heartwarming. Puppet sex is fun, puppet sex can be difficult, puppet sex is important, we should talk about puppet sex more. We should talk about sex more!
Is Sex Lives of Puppets entertaining, educational or both?
Hopefully both, but mostly entertaining. When it is educational I hope it isn’t didactic. We don’t have a message. I hope we make a safe space for people to engage with diverse sexual conversations in a really fun way and I hope they inspire people to continue talking afterwards in the bar and for the rest of their lives. When we began the project, I was worried that the subject would be triggering and that people might get embarrassed or upset by it, but in fact we found that everyone loves talking about sex and I couldn’t get the puppets to shut up.
Puppets don’t reproduce of course, so they really talk about the pleasure of sex and the role sex plays in relationships. So, the show concentrates on the juicy stuff, rather than the biology. And it’s funny!
What part of the show would you like people to be quoting or re-enacting in years to come?
Haha – I daren’t presume to know what people are going to like or remember but… some of my favourite lines so far: “Sex is such good fun”, “She wanks me off”, “Pounding away”. And my top favourite is “the cum-blob”. I think the professors at NATSAL would be very pleased if people started using the term “Sexual Wellbeing”, which is part of their proposal that everyone should think of sex as an important part of a healthy and fulfilled life. If people quoted that it would be a great legacy for the show.
If the puppets could host a dinner party, which 3 guests would they invite?
Basil Brush, Stormy Daniels, and Monzaemon Chikamatsu the great Japanese 17th Century writer of plays for the Bunraku Puppet Theatre. I think they would all get on. You’d have 70’s foxy puppetry, political sex scandal, and epic theatre about lovers committing suicide. It would be a wild night.
The conversation around sex is always evolving and changing and it feels like the younger generation are much more open to discussion and conversations around it. Do you agree, and does that mean there will there be a Sex Lives of Puppets part 2?
Yes I think that is right. Certainly, I’ve learned a lot from the younger members of the company. I think they are more open and more confident talking about sex certainly than I was and probably am. So I hope the conversation is evolving and this must be a good thing in the long run. It goes wrong along the way of course, but more talking and more openness must lead to more understanding in the end.
I like the idea of part 2, yes, great idea, but we should see how part 1 goes first. I might start calling it part 1 now though in preparation! And hey why stop at 2? Like I said the puppets won’t stop talking about sex!
The Sex Lives of Puppets will be performed at 21:30 at the Pleasance Courtyard (Beyond) from 31st July – 25th August (not 7th or 14th)
Booking Link: https://www.pleasance.co.uk/event/sex-lives-puppets