The Bread and Puppet Theater has announced a spring tour that includes several appearances in and around Washington County. They will be in Manchester Vermont on Saturday March 28, in Bennington on Monday March 30 and in Cambridge New York on Friday and Saturday. April 3 and 4. Click here for more info.
For those unfamiliar with Bread and Puppet, they are the creation of Peter and Elka Schumann and have been staging original theater pieces for 63 years. The troupe is based in rural Glover, Vermont. According to Shumann:
"We have two types of puppet shows: good ones and
bad ones, but all of them are for good and against evil."
The shows are often politically radical and definitely not MAGA endorsed. The 'Bread' in their name comes from the practice of sharing sourdough rye with the audience after each show and the 'Puppet' refers to their large cardboard and paper mache creations.
"We give you a piece of bread with the puppet show
because our bread and theater belong together. For a
long time the theater arts have been separated from the stomach."
- Peter Schumann
I first saw them many years ago at Skidmore College in Saratoga and most recently last summer at one of their Circus's in Glover. (Unfortunately, an earlier in the day hike up nearby Wheeler Mountain left me in need of a nap and I slept thru most of the Circus!) The performances in Glover remind you of mini-Woodstocks with lot's of hippie vib, plenty of tie dye and the occasional VW microbus.
Definitely check out the local shows this spring but for the full Bread and Puppet experience I would recommend a trip to the Northeast Kingdom of Vermont later this summer. If you've got a few days there is plenty of hiking and biking nearby and a paddle or beach day on Lake Willoughby is a must. The New Yorker's restaurant critic visited the area and raved about the local food scene in a recent issue. There is also the quirky Museum of Everyday Life as well as Bread and Puppets own museum of art work from past performances.
