Puppet workshop by Liebe Wetzel from Lunatique Fantasique

A wad of newsprint, a sweatshirt, a creature made from PVC pipe tubes.... Performance alchemist Liebe Wetzel and her ensemble release the sweet, sad, naive, and lustful beings inside"ordinary"objects. In the absence of language, her puppets speak universal truths.

Liebe Wetzel, Artistic Director, is the artist formerly known as Too Too Tomato, and has performed in a variety of incarnations including puppeteer, performance artist, mime, stilt walker, and clown at a staggering number of fairs, festivals, and theaters throughout the West Coast. She is a graduate of the Dell Arte School of Physical Theatre, and has trained with Keith Johnstone at the Loose Moose Theatre in Canada. She holds a BA in Biology and Biochemistry from Rice University. In 1999 Wetzel debuted her now award-winning style of ordinary object puppetry with a collection of vignettes for adults, Naked Foam and Objects in Predicaments, written and performed by Wetzel with the assistance of director Jeff Raz on comediturgy and the helping hands of a small ensemble of manipulators.

Since 2000, Wetzel and Lunatique Fantastique created and performed in several acclaimed productions, including"Reframing the Hourglass," "Snake in the Basement: The Prosecution of Rev. Bill Pruitt,""The Wrapping Paper Caper,"a holiday-themed show for children and adults,"Brace Yourself!,"and"My Dinner With Lunatique Fantastique."Her innovative work has won many awards including the S.F. Bay Guardian Goldie Award for best new theater talent, as well as Best of Fringe and Top Box Office Hit in the 2001 S.F. Fringe Festival and 2004 S. F. Fringe Festival. The Company performed for the San Francisco Opera in 2005 in Pique Dame. The company toured the U.K. with 3 different shows to rave reviews. She has taught her unique puppetry style to teens in a residency program at Zeum, at The Clown Conservatory, and to teen acting students at Cal Shakes' summer program. In addition, she has taught devising theatre using object puppetry at Sonoma State University.

The year 13 students worked with Liebe on techniques about object theatre and practically worked on ideas for using puppetry in their production of Pillow man that they will perform in May.