Hi folks,

Frankie and team will be in the Philippines from 23 to 28 Feb 2010 to participate in the 2nd ASEAN Puppetry Festival as well as the 3rd Meeting of the ASEAN Puppetry Association, which will be happening concurrently. The event will be held at the University of the Philippines in Diliman, Quezon City, Philippines.

Frankie will be performing in the festival opening on the 24th, as well as on two other shows on 26th (10am and 2.30pm). He will also be meeting performers and puppeteers from different ASEAN nations there. Do join us if you are in the Philippines, drop by and say hi to Frankie!

Special thanks to the National Arts Council (Singapore) and the Lee Foundation for their support of this trip, and to the ASEAN Puppetry Association for their efforts in promoting the art of puppetry!

P.S. The pictures are from the 1st ASEAN Puppetry Festival in Palembang, Indonesia in 2007!

Supported by:

Hi friends,

Frankie will be performing this month at the following locations:

16 Jan 2010, 8.30pm – Redhill Square (in between the food centre and wet market at  Blks 79 and 85. Five minutes walk from Redhill MRT)

17 Jan 2010, 5.15pm – Sun Plaza Central Atrium (opposite Sembawang MRT)

28 Jan 2010, 12.30pm – SMU Arts Fest @ Singapore Management University (Underground Atrium near Koufu foodcourt)

These shows are free of charge and open to the public, so do drop by and say hi!

Amanda Zhang from youth-oriented WhyOhGee (pronounced Y-O-G) website interviewed Frankie and wrote a great article about the creation of the mascots. I’ve reproduced it here for your convenience, or you can also CLICK HERE to read the article on its actual website.

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The creators of Lyo & Merly

By Amanda Zhang

23 November 2009

It’s official, the mascots of the first Youth Olympic Games are here to take over the world.

Lyo the lion cub, and Merly the merlion cub, with their big, innocent eyes, funky hairdos and oh-so-huggable bodies are definite crowd pleasers.

At the mascot launch held over the weekend, the crowd went gaga when Lyo and Merly went public for the first time. There was an endless stream of people waiting to take photographs with the two new faces of the Singapore 2010 Youth Olympic Games.

Like Pinnochio, Lyo and Merly needed a pair of loving hands to craft them to become the iconic creatures they are today.

Back from left: Mr. Michael Chong (Mascots and Puppets Specialists), Ms. Bee GOH (Cubix, COO), Mr. Stanley TOH (Cubix, Creative and Account Director) Ms. Weena LEE (Cubix, Art Director) Front from left: Mr. Frankie Yeo (Mascots and Puppets Specialists),Ms. Dawn WONG (Cubix, Account Manager)

The creative brains behind Lyo and Merly are the good people from Cubix International.

Cubix’s proposal was one of seven shortlisted mascot design proposals submitted earlier this year. With their unique and youthful twist on two iconic Singapore creatures, Cubix’s design was chosen.

For one, Lyo is a lion cub and does not have a shaggy mane. Instead of unkempt facial hair, Lyo keeps a burst of wavy, stylish red hair presumably kept in place with some gel or wax.

As for Merly, she is a merlion cub who does not have a fish’s tail. What remains of her merlion heritage though is a set of tiered scales on her arms and legs which adds to her demure and sweet appearance (think tiered wedding cakes and dresses).

Cubix, which specializes in branding, animation and character development, took great effort to research on Olympic mascots from previous Games.

Their research led them to move away from another set of designs which they were working on – robots. The robot theme was initially developed to showcase Singapore as a technologically advanced country. Through their research however, Cubix realized that mascot animals have always been a success and they wisely decided to stick to the theme of a lion and a merlion.

Image illustrations owned by Cubix International. Robots, durians and bad hair days were byproducts of Cubix’s development of the mascots.

Character development was what really brought the mascots to life. Cubix wanted to create a pair of mascots who had contrasting yet complementary personalities.

Lyo is ambitious, fiery and fun-loving. A typical boy-next-door, he dreams of winning basketball medals. Merly, on the other hand, is soft and demure. She is a vegeterian and loves the environment. Her harmless hobbies? Swimming and singing.

Born and bred in Singapore, Lyo and Merly’s diet include the local delights. With his fiery personality, Lyo loves chili crab and chicken rice with lots of chilli. One wonders how Lyo uses his paws to eat crabs though.

Merly prefers desserts and enjoys ice kachang, a local dessert of shaved ice drenched in condensed milk and colourful sweet syrup. Brain freeze!

From 2D to 3D

The hands that built the life-sized mascot suits were the team from Mascots and Puppets Specialists, led by Frankie Yeo.

One of the challenges they faced was transforming the mascots from two-dimensional to three-dimensional creatures. Choosing the right material and texture for the body and hair were crucial decisions Frankie’s team had to make.

The main material chosen to make the life-sized suits was eventually foam. It was not only light, it was also able to retain its shape even if Lyo had to squeeze through a door.

Mascot wearers have a heavy weight on their shoulders – literally. The heads turned out to be considerably heavy with Lyo’s head weighing a whopping 8 kilograms and Merly’s head weighing 6 kilograms.

To prevent heads from rolling (pun intended), the huge heads are strapped onto a harness donned by the mascot wearer. Lastly, to keep the mascot wearer from overheating, there is an inbuilt fan in the suit and optional vests lined with cool packs to keep the poor ladmascot wearer nice and cool.

Lyo and Merly were conceived and brought to life through the meeting of creative minds and a common passion for the Singapore 2010 Youth Olympic Games.

We warmly welcome Lyo and Merly to the Singapore 2010 family!

Source: Singapore 2010: First Youth Olympic Games: YOG The creators of Lyo & Merly.

(Thanks to Mike Lim for the great photographs!)

Mascots and Puppets Specialists and our friends at the Arts House have come up with an exciting children’s holiday programme from 20-22 December 2009 (1pm and 3.30pm daily). Do check out our e-flyer below and do bring your children, nephews, and nieces for our Puppets Play Time at the Arts House!

Frankie will be performing and teaching at this special year-end programme at the Arts House, so don’t miss this great opportunity to encounter the art of string puppetry!

For enquiries, please contact us at 68412260. See you there!

TICKETING

You can purchase your tickets at

Website: www.bytes.sg

Hotline: 63326919

In person: The Arts House Box Office (at 1 Old Parliament Lane Singapore 179429)

Click to Download Full-size E-Flyer (right-click and save)

We’re pleased to announce the launch of our new party puppet show website, Puppet Party Magic! Just point your browsers to puppetpartymagic.com to take a look at some of our special offerings for birthday parties, children’s shows, and cozy family get-togethers!

You can look forward to puppet shows that are specially catered for young folks and smaller venues. These programmes will feature an exciting combination of unique string puppets, puppets, magic and side-splitting humour that will make your party come alive!

For more bookings or more information, visit puppetpartymagic.com! If you have any thoughts, suggestions for improvements, or queries, just drop us an email at info@puppetpartymagic.com. Do us a favor and link us on your blog/website and let your friends know!

Hi friends, we are constructing some puppets for an upcoming holiday production entitled ‘Magical Garden’. It will be an acrobatic performance, but will feature some of our very special marionettes which have been custom-made for this production.

The performances are from 5 to 13 Dec 2009 at the new City Square Mall (next to Farrer Park MRT) at the Atrium on level one. Showtimes are 7pm on Tuesdays to Fridays, and 1pm, 3pm, and 7pm on weekends. Performances are open to public.

Drop by and take a look if you’re in the area!

just a quick heads up that Frankie will be performing his signature marionette show, String Fling!, at the Asians Civilisations Museum this weekend at the Ngee Ann Auditorium (basement). The show times are:

21 Nov 09: 1.30pm – 2pm, and 4pm – 4.30pm

22 Nov 09: 12.30pm – 1pm, and 3.30pm – 4pm

Admission charges to ACM apply, but the show is free, so drop by ACM this weekend for a great puppet show and a tour around the museum!

Contact:

Asian Civilisations Museum

1 Empress Place Singapore 179555

Tel: 65-6332 2982, 65-6332 7798

We’ve been getting positive reviews from the press. Here’s an review from TODAY newspaper just released this Monday:

Kampung spirit(s) lives on
by Mayo Martin

H IS For Hantu is about keeping the kampung spirit – or spirits – alive.

But there’s only so much that this inspired piece of supernatural comedy-cum-musical by Stages artistic director Jonathan Lim can do if an audience is reluctant to share that sense of community that it espouses.

It’s not just the bad acoustics and sound mix that Hantu – which I enjoyed, imperfections and all – has going against it. Instead, it’s potentially the spectre of scepticism from an air-conditioned generation far removed from the situation.

For the first time, I was actually contemplating if it would have been better to watch a matinee run. At least children are game enough to clap and sing along, which the musical at times requests from its audience.

Set in a neighbourhood that’s stranger than Avenue Q, the musical is set in Singapore’s other last kampung – the one in the forest behind Kampung Pisang Abadi that’s inhabited by some quirky hantus.

It’s set to make way for HDBs and eager beaver village boy Sazali wants to stop it, with help from his gang of ghosts – including an all-head-and-entrails penanggalang and a hilariously bitchy pontianak with cabaret singer aspirations.

Lim gleefully mines the folklore for its potential gags and puns, connects it to the contemporary, creates a kind of panto-meets-dikir barat hybrid. Such a heartfelt understanding of his imagined milieu made, for me, the deeper issue of the loss of home more credible and meaningful.

Bringing to life Lim’s vision were the performances particularly by Jo Tan as “Cik Pon(tianak)” and Ghazali Muzakir as Sazali, as well as puppet designer Frankie Malachi’s ingenuous creations which proved that even puppets can have great comedic timing.

It was fun watching ghosts come to life. It would’ve been even more fun if the audience didn’t act like zombies.

H Is For Hantu runs until Aug 23, 3pm and 8pm at AGF Theatre, Alliance Francaise de Singapour. Tickets at $30 to $40 from Gatecrash. Advisory: Supernatural Themes.