Spring Break
Master of puppets
MFA student brings Poe's classic to life through puppetry
Natalie Abreu
Issue date: 4/9/09 Section: Focus
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"Behind the Scenes - The Making of The Tell Tale Heart" will appear from April 6-15 in the Student Union Art Gallery, which will also feature art of a more unusual kind to most UConn students: puppetry. In fact, UConn is only one of two colleges (soon to be three) in the United States that features an undergraduate Puppetry Arts program and the only to feature a MA and MFA Graduate Puppetry Arts program, something "The Tell-Tale Heart" director Lyn Kagen, who goes by Lynne Cohen in her artistic work, a 3rd-year MFA Puppetry Candidate, was greatly interested in and drove her to come to UConn.
"I had an interest in producing, directing and puppetry, so I thought if I came here to pursue my Masters degree in puppetry, I would have the opportunity to learn about all of these things and then be in a much better position to start creating my own work," Kagen said. "I also had a great interest in filmmaking, so I decided that I wanted to make a film for my master's project so I could learn more about that medium."
As indicated in her director's note, Kagen also is commenting on current social changes with her piece, including new technologies that are making language secondary to visuals, as well as society's morbid fascination with the minds of people who commit violent acts.
Though the film is only about 40 minutes in length, the conception of the project started almost three years ago during her second semester at UConn.
"I made a short trailer which I showed when I pitched the project for my thesis to kind of give people an idea of what I was trying to do. Then I shot an 8-minute test of it last summer at the O'Neill Puppetry Conference, which was great, because I learned a lot of things that I did want to do and a lot of things that I didn't want to do."
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