GET OUT
THE MESA TRIBUNE | JULY 25, 2021
Like us:
Follow us:
TheMesaTribune.com
|
@EVTNow
25 GetOutAZ @GetOutAZ
/EVTNow
Puppeteer ready for a Valley road show BY ROB WINDER Cronkite News
S
tacey Gordon’s road to becoming a puppeteer began very early in life. “I don’t know a preschooler that doesn’t look at ‘Sesame Street’ and say, ‘I want to live there.’ I de�initely wanted to do that,” she said. The Phoenix resident made that childhood dream a reality in 2016, when she was selected as the puppeteer behind one of “Sesame Street’s” newest neighbors, Julia. Like Gordon’s son, Julia is autistic. In addition to her work on “Sesame Street,” Gordon owns and operates Puppet Pie, a downtown studio at Grand Avenue and McKinley Street where she builds puppets available for purchase, and where children of all ages apply science, math, engineering and art concepts as they create puppets of their own. Now, with help from a grant from the Arizona Commission on the Arts, Gordon and her puppets might soon be coming to your street. Gordon was one of 24 Arizona artists awarded the commission’s research and development grants for 2021. The $5,000 grants were given to the artists to “advance their artistic practice, expand their creative horizons, and deepen the impact of their work,” according to the commission’s website. Gordon is using her grant to bring the fun of Puppet Pie to Valley neighborhoods with a vehicle that’s already beloved by many children: an ice cream truck. Last year, Gordon purchased a 1973 step van from Conrad Martinez, owner of Mis�its Cick Kustoms, who is restoring and modifying the truck to be used as a mobile puppet studio and theater. “It will allow me to bring my art to underserved communities,” Gordon said. “Not every kid can get in a car and drive here. Not every parent has the resources to bring their kids here.” The truck won’t merely make the workshop activities of Puppet Pie portable.
“To me, there would be nothing more fun and special than getting to come to a puppet ice cream party where you watch a show, you get to eat popsicles and ice cream. And then you get to make a puppet and bring it home,” Stacey Gordon says. “And doing that in communities and making it accessible is kind of where my heart is.” (Courtesy of Stacey Gordon) Gordon also will use the truck to put on full-�ledged puppet shows for families. “I’ve done short pieces for children. I do a lot of work with children, but it’s all workshops,” Gordon said. “This grant is allowing me to take time and build a show the right way. And bring in a story from start to �inish that has a lesson in it, that does teach kids to be OK with themselves and to persevere and to try and think outside of the box.” That ambition and sense of mission wasn’t part of Gordon’s original vision for putting her puppets on wheels. Initially, because many of her puppets are foodthemed, she was simply looking for a fun way to juxtapose her booth at Phoenix Fan Fusion with the food cart she always found herself next to each year. “I thought, ‘Wouldn’t it be hilarious if I’m selling the exact same thing, but as puppets?” Gordon recalled. Gordon credits her dad with inspiring
her to use the ice cream truck for something more. “I really was just going to do just a little space where I could keep my stuff in there and then roll into a festival or fair and sell my puppets that I made,” she said. To create the kind of mobile show she envisions now – developing a script, music and the “actors” – would require Gordon to take a couple of months off from her puppet-building workshops, she said. But “the constant grind of doing all the workshops” is what keeps the rent and utilities paid at her studio, not to mention what allows her to make a living as an artist. “It would take me years to be able to do this, if it weren’t for this grant,” Gordon said. The grant will also be used to obtain the various permits she will need to hold both public and private events across metro Phoenix, as well as purchase items needed
to perform. Additionally, the grant has also accelerated the restoration of the truck itself, which required even more work than expected, Gordon said. When it comes to getting an old ice cream truck back on the road to bring smiles in a different way, “there’s a lot that goes into it,” Gordon said. The same should not be true of the application process for the grant, said Kesha Bruce, the Arizona Commission on the Arts’ artist program manager. Like Gordon’s truck, that process recently underwent a renovation to be less intimidating for applicants, she said. “The goal of it was to make it so that it wasn’t so labor intensive and cumbersome, especially for �irst-time applicants,” she said. Rather than use “grant speak,” applicants are urged to be their authentic selves and talk to the selection panel “like you would speak to a normal person,” Bruce said. Answers to the application questions can be given in an audio or video recording instead of in writing, she said. Besides passion and heart – and puppets – younger patrons of Gordon’s ice cream truck probably will want to see some actual ice cream. They won’t be disappointed. A new freezer has been installed in the truck. “To me, there would be nothing more fun and special than getting to come to a puppet ice cream party where you watch a show, you get to eat popsicles and ice cream,” Gordon said. “And then you get to make a puppet and bring it home. And doing that in communities and making it accessible is kind of where my heart is.” ■
••
