Tuesday, April 6, 2010 (Part 8):One of the things for which Prague is well known is its marionettes. There are tourist shops everywhere selling marionettes of all styles, figures and sizes. They were even selling Obama marionettes! And there are several theaters in Prague that exist for the sole purpose of presenting marionette shows. Perhaps the longest running and most well know of these is "Don Giovanni" presented by the National Marionette Theater.
We picked up our tickets for the show early in the day and learned that it was "open seating" with the doors opening 30 minutes before curtain time. So, of course, we had to get there 30 minutes before curtain time so that we could get the best possible seats. We did, and we were rewarded with seats in the center of the second row.
As you might expect, this was a fairly intimate theater. I'm guessing that it could seat maybe 100 people. The stage itself is relatively small. The marionettes are about 3-feet tall, and the puppet-masters stand behind the set, and hang over it from the top. We could see their hands and their upper bodies. It looked a lot like the marionette show that we all know and love from the movie "Sound of Music."
The show was fabulous -- thoroughly entertaining. It started with a conductor marionette who provided the comic relief throughout the show. We then proceeded to a fairly full presentation of Mozart's opera, "Don Giovanni." Katherine and I didn't know the story, so we read a summary of it online earlier in the day. It's a pretty dark opera. Don Giovanni is the ultimate villain. He as no redeeming qualities as far as I could tell. But seeing this opera performed by puppets, obviously, added a completely new dimension. It was great fun.
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