Even If You Get Tired, You’re Having Fun!
The More I Enjoyed It, The More I Invested:
My Journey of Becoming a Puppeteer by Chance
Wu Zhengde’s first impressions of glove puppetry came from Wangye Temple in his hometown of Hsinchu. He recalls “On the first month of every year, there would always be local performances in front of the temple. In accordance with local tradition, each performance had its own status, Taiwanese opera was often ranked higher than glove puppetry. Therefore, on Wangye’s birthday, opera is performed. Sometimes, believers come and give offerings of gratitude to the gods. So the puppetry stage had to be placed at the side instead of the center. Thus, two performances would be going on at the same time, puppetry and opera. For children, the puppet performances were much more entertaining than opera.”
Before the modernization of television, watching glove puppetry performances was a daily treat for children. Like the childhood of many Taiwanese people, Wu started watching glove puppetry shows at a young age. Before going to college, he spent most of his time watching performances with friends, taking part in the exciting atmosphere. The temple would always invite the same troupe to perform. Over the years, he witnessed the passing on of a legacy from generation to generation. The father of the troupe retiring and his son coming to take over. Wu was growing up as well. He forgot the name of the troupe and the plays they performed, but he will always remember the name of the main character, Great Hero Jiangshan (大俠一江山).
“Children don’t remember the disputes and conflicts between characters, they only remember how entertaining and lively everything was. That’s when glove puppetry left an impression on me. I wasn’t learning it intentionally. I fell in love with it naturally. Just like how many people nowadays like celebrities.”
Like many college students, after getting admitted, he began a rich and exciting campus club life. Some joined dance clubs and some joined guitar clubs. Wu was originally in the boy scout club, but then by chance he encountered glove puppetry again. At the time, he just felt that it was more interesting compared to other activities. But he never thought that the more he participated, the more serious about it he became. After graduation, he didn’t look for a job like other students. He became a performer for a puppetry troupe. “My club life had nothing to do with my future career. Nobody knew what I would be doing after I graduated.” Wu said.
In February of 1987, Wu Zhengde, who was in his third year of National Taiwan University’s (NTU) Department of Mechanical Engineering, founded the NTU Glove Puppetry Club and became its first club leader. The club was divided into two main committees, the academic and the theater. The academic was responsible for researching the Taiwanese language. The theater was responsible for performances.
When asked what’s “fun” about puppetry, Wu replied “Not only could you act, you could also write scripts. You could learn to play many instruments, including drums, gongs, strings, etc. There was no limit to the things you could do. If you don’t have a good voice and couldn’t perform on stage as a xiaosheng (younger male character) or laosheng (older male character), you could play the suona. If you can’t play the suona, play the drums. There’s just so much you could do.”
The Same Exceptional Quality: Seden Traditional Theater
Wu mentioned, a lot of people mistaken NTU Glove Puppetry Club and Seden Glove Puppetry Foundation as the same organization. But they’re different, one is a student club and the other is a social organization. In fact, you could say that NTU’s club was inspired by Seden. There is indeed a relationship between the two.
Besides NTU Glove Puppetry Club, Seden Traditional Theater, who have continued performances even until now, was also inspired by Seden. Seden Traditional Theater was founded in 1990 and was supported by the Foundation for the first three years. Xie Dexi, the director of the Foundation was the first theater manager. Everything, including hiring teachers, coordinating props and sets, purchasing instruments and puppets, and setting up the stage, was all handled by the foundation.
Wu, at the time, was in charge of basic day-to-day affairs of the theater. Due to Seden Traditional Theater not being a professional theatrical company. Practice hours were not based on a fixed schedule. There were only around 10 members, who each had their own full-time jobs. Everything needed managing and coordinating, whether it was deciding on what play to perform, when to perform, or who was attending or not.
At the same time, the Seden Foundation was also hosting seminars, exhibitions, and promotional events. After three years of support, the Traditional Theater officially registered itself as an independent theater company. Wu became the second manager of the theater, being responsible for teaching and performing. From then on, Seden Traditional Theater was no longer affiliated with the Seden Foundation. The two became good friends who supported each other.
Yet the founding of Seden Traditional Theater was not achieved overnight. It all started with Seden Foundation’s glove puppetry course. The purpose of the course was to train future performers. The duration of one course was three months, once every week. The course included learning to handle the puppets on the front stage and playing instruments in the back. Anyone who was interested could participate with a maximum of 30 students per course. The course continued to operate for three years. Some students became more and more interested and later on became members of the theater.
As time went on and as most members had their own plans for life, the members of the Traditional Theater began to decrease. Today, the Theater is still running but events are not as common as before. Wu mentioned that Seden Traditional Theater insists on only performing traditional puppet shows with the same exceptional quality. They don’t allow themselves to put on low-quality performances just because they have less members. There is no compromise. “We want to perform the traditional shows that made us fall in love with glove puppetry at first!” Wu said.
Speaking on recent times where there are less performances, Wu looked disheartened but calm, “I’m going to be frank, this theatrical company is no longer profitable. It’s like we’re back in the beginning. There was a time when the theater was lively and we even hoped to turn professional. But now, it feels like we’re back at square one. Anyone who wants to join and have fun is welcomed. We’re still having fun and we still persist on our founding vision. This is how we’re a bit different from the Foundation.”
Legacy and Promotion: It All Comes from the Heart
For Wu, Seden reflected Taiwan society’s change of attitude towards local and traditional culture. In the 1980s, when the Seden Glove Puppetry Foundation just began, three NTU professors called for the preservation of glove puppetry. This indeed caught a lot of attention and glove puppetry was on the rise again. But later on, most people were more attracted to the Pili glove puppetry television show. And the traditional drums and gongs, suona-blowing glove puppetry became less popular.
“Sometimes I would dream that maybe some kids of this generation would be interested in preserving glove puppetry. Then we may have a chance of maintaining some interest. But now it’s almost an impossibility to recreate the thriving popularity my teacher Huang Junxiong had in his days. In his time, glove puppetry show viewership was 90% high. Nowadays, it’d be nice to even have 3%. I can only say, times have changed.” Maybe in the future, glove puppetry would be a representation of traditional culture. Just like the dances of the Amis or the Pasibutbut of the Bunun. It could fully represent our traditional culture but would not be part of our daily lives. You’d never know.”
Promoting and preserving are two different aspects. Though both are not easy, preserving is relatively more difficult. Wu explained, from a performers point of view, compared with antiques, documents, and relics, performing techniques are what really needs preserving. Furthermore, mentoring is for the long term, promoting is for the short. Glove puppetry classes and seminars are usually for children in the 4th Grade and over. In order to reach younger kids and leave an impression at an early age, they focus more on promotional activities. For example, giving the gongs to children and letting them smash away. They might not understand what’s going on, but they enjoy the process. Give them two puppets and they’d play with it the entire recess. For them it’s solely for fun. You don’t need to teach them any specifics.
“For me, you don’t have to teach the children anything technical. Just let them play and have fun. If they have fun, it’ll leave an impression. If they stumble upon it one day, then they’ll have memories of playing with it before. Just like how I stumbled upon it in my college years, the memories of my childhood came back. They may not necessarily be a performer, but they may be part of the audience.”
Looking back on Wu’s career as a puppeteer, he was introduced to puppetry at a young age. Even though he didn’t watch performances every day when he was young, it still left a clear mark on his life. For Wu, when he hosts promotional puppetry events, he wouldn’t split his participants into different age groups, such as middle-aged, elders, or kindergarten children who may not even pronounce properly. For Wu, it doesn’t matter what age group you belong to, what matters is if you have the heart. “I usually don’t teach a lot. I just stay there and let them play around for 40 to 50 minutes. It’s not a long time. They’ll play until they get tired. But what’s most important is that they’re having fun.”