Yerevan’s Hovhannes Tumanyan State Puppet Theater Visits East Coast

The Tumanyan Puppet Theater was founded in 1935 and has a building as its headquarters in Yerevan along with a distinguished history. With a large staff, its presentations can include as many as 17 performers.

Babayan said in an interview that he began working in the puppet theater from 1980 as head of its literary division and then as a stage director. In 1998 he became its chief artistic director and manager. The theater maintains a large permanent repertoire of 34 different pieces. They include both Armenian works and various famous international ones and represent all the types of puppetry art ranging from finger and hand puppets to marionettes. The theater has given presentations all over the world, in countries as distant as India or Kazakhstan. In these places, English only is used. Last year in 2011 it participated in seven international festivals.

Babayan teaches at Yerevan’s Theater and Film Institute where he holds a chair in Acting Skills and Production. He has prepared three generations of puppeteers who all are now working at his puppet theater. In general, there are a large number of young people working there.

Babayan said, “The theater changes with time and must always remain contemporary. At the same time, some of its presentations have continued in the repertory for 35 years. The stories of Tumanyan, Alexander Pushkin, Hans Christian Anderson, Shakespeare and others are classics, so the main changes in their productions are new actors.” However, Babayan pointed out, there is one chief aspect in his work that has changed: “The rhythm of the times has become more rapid and so the production must also become more condensed. For example, a trip to the United States used to take one month a century ago and now it is just a matter of hours. Staging cannot avoid taking this into consideration.”

This East Coast tour is a first in a number of aspects. Not only is it the first visit of the theater to the US, but this is the first time that it travels as the result of an invitation from Armenian communities. Babayan pointed out that while outside Armenia, its role is often to introduce Armenian culture to non-Armenians, though sometimes Armenians turn up at performances too. He related one amusing anecdote: “We primarily participate in international festivals. Last year we went to Hungary for a festival and performed. The festival director afterwards introduced himself and said that I am Armenian. He said that he was waiting to see how the performance would be before revealing that he is Armenian.”

Babayan felt that videos, films and modern technology have not lessened the value of puppet theater. Each time a new technology is introduced, people fear that older forms of art will die out. It was the same with theater when film was introduced, or film when television began to be available, yet these fears turned out to be largely unfounded. The live connection with an audience is unique.