Father Goose started the play with a tirade on his wife, Mother Goose. And for good reason.

"You know those stories she is so famous for telling?" he asked the audience. "You know, the one about the egg who took a fall, those poor kids who live in the Nike, and that stupid girl who should have been arrested for breaking and entering the Bears' pad?"

A few youngsters answered in the affirmative. Some nodded their heads. Most just gandered at the feathered narrator.

"Well, I wrote them," he continued, sounding understandably upset over his missus's plagiarism. "She took them, maybe changed a few minor points, here and there, and made a killing with them on The New York Times Bestseller List. Now, I'm here to set the record straight, and tell the stories the way they were meant to be told--the way I wrote them. So, sit back and relax and enjoy the fairy tales of Father Goose...."

For forty minutes, Father Goose and a gaggle of colorful characters captivated a roomful of patients at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP). The characters, themselves, are nothing more than puppets, fashioned from simple materials: paper-mache, coats of paint, pieces of brightly colored cloth. But in the hands of four talented Penn undergraduates, the puppets came to life--cracking jokes, teaching valuable lessons about individuality and friendship, and bringing smiles to the faces of sick children.

The puppet play was born through PLAY--Philo's Living and Advocating Youth Committee. PLAY is the brainchild of Elliott Witney (C'97), an officer in the Philomathean Society (Philo for short).

As members of Penn's oldest student group, students in Philo work hard to promote learning and increase the academic prestige of the University. Naturally, Witney wanted them to add PLAY to their busy schedules.

"The idea is that if you are not relaxed, and you're stressed out, you won't produce anything," he explained.

Last year, PLAY planned activities reminiscent of the days of youth. Philo members chased each other through games of tag. They climbed trees. In short, they had a good time. But something was missing. Philo members concluded that PLAY should incorporate some community service into its events. Only they weren't sure how.

Until April Richard (C'96) came along.

Richard believed a puppet show would be the perfect way to provide community service while still serving PLAY's main purpose: having fun in a childlike fashion. Witney agreed, adding that CHOP would be a good place for the play.

"Sick children have nothing to do except sit around and be sick," he said. "So let's brighten their lives a little bit."

CHOP's Child Life Department gave the students certain guidelines to follow. They also reviewed the play's script for appropriateness and requested a few changes. Not because the play was too mature for young audiences, but because the average child doesn't have the vocabulary of a typical Penn student.

"We changed words like 'monarch' to 'king,' " Richard said with a chuckle.

Even after the rewrites, some of the jokes went over the children's heads. When the play's wicked witch--a ubiquitous character in any fairy tale--slunk off to turn a newt into a congressman, the children sat stony-faced. But the parents and nurses in the room grinned in appreciation.

Subtle political humor aside, the play offered plenty to keep the kids entertained. "I thought the script was very cute," said Amanda Butler, a child life assistant at CHOP, "and the children really seemed to enjoy it."

The script is actually two scripts, tied together by Father Goose's narration. Although Father Goose takes credit for the tales, the real authors are Philo members. Jeff Wachs (C'97) penned the first story. A twist on a common theme, it's about a wicked witch who turns a frog into a prince. While one might expect the onetime amphibian to bask in the luxury of royal mammalian comfort, the former frog longs for his flippers and lily pad.

"It's very funny," Richard said. "Jeff is very talented at comedy."

Not so funny is Utpal the tiger, the protagonist of the second story. Utpal tries to impress the other animals in the jungle by telling jokes. The problem is, he's not a very good comedian. In fact, he stinks.

"It has a moral in it about friendship," Richard said of the story, written by Richard Cardona (C'96). "The moral of the story is to be yourself."

Cardona and Wachs were only two of the Penn students who helped make the puppet show possible. Nearly 30 people, many not affiliated with Philo, chipped in by building the theater and designing the puppets.

Funding for the play came from Philo's treasury. SAC also reimbursed some of the purchases made by Richard, who got discounts from vendors in West Philadelphia.

"We've tried to keep it as low-cost as possible," she said.

"Without stealing," Witney chimed in.

Luck and generosity also played pivotal roles. During a last-minute search for some plywood for the puppet theater, Richard noticed a construction worker at College Hall. "I asked, 'Do you know where I can get two sheets of plywood at two in the afternoon?' " she recalled. "He said, 'We've got two extra sheets for you.' That turned out to be a lifesaver."

When the students couldn't get something they wanted, they made do with what they had. That's why one of the puppets, an elephant, is pink. "We couldn't find any gray material," Richard said, laughing.

This kind of creative spontaneity was also demonstrated backstage. Some unforeseen mishaps called for impromptu solutions.

"We had some problems behind the scenes, like scripts falling on the floor in a thousand places, but no one knew that on the other side, and we had fun, improvising at some areas," Richard said. "One of the main props, a little frog that turns the frog prince back into a frog, dropped, so we improvised, and that was fun, too."

Richard and three other Philo members used nine puppets to portray 11 characters. That meant that the puppeteers had to master multiple voices. "I had to work on my laugh," said Richard, who provided the wicked witch's sinister cackle, as well as the voice of the pink elephant. Albert Dickson (C'96), Caith Kushner (C'99) and Wachs, who showed that he can act as well as he can write, rounded out the cast.

The Penn students encouraged audience participation, and the youngsters enthusiastically accepted the invitation, reciting dialogue and providing sound effects. The puppeteers also mingled with the children.

"At the beginning and end of the play, they were allowed to actually handle the puppets and meet the puppeteers, and they really enjoyed that," Butler said.

Richard said that many of the children wanted to play with Utpal, who, despite his horrible jokes, won the approval of the audience. The king--the "monarch" of the original script--was also a hit.

"The king has a very funny voice," Richard said, "so everyone wanted to come up and talk to him."

Since Philo now has all of the props needed to put on a puppet play, Richard hopes to take the show on the road--perhaps performing at schools and other hospitals. The play will also stop back at CHOP. Butler welcomes the encore.

"I'd love to have more puppet shows in the hospital," she said.

Return to Compass Features for May 7, 1996