The Tragical Comedy or Comical Tragedy of Mr. Punch by Neil Gaiman

It is such a moody, evocative delight every time I lay my eyes on his work. If you are unfamiliar with him, Dave McKean loves to mix media in his art and that is on full display here. The real hero of this graphic novel is the art. He finds that horror can be twisted to humor, and the things that make some people laugh are truly chilling, especially seen through the eyes of a child. His time with his grandparents is the boy’s crucible, and this story is his adult mind narrating and trying to make sense of his memories. The local Punch and Judy Man, who puts on grotesque puppet plays for children, becomes a touchstone for the boy and the puppeteer’s stage holds strange and terrifying mysteries, which subtextually explore how we view life when afflicted with the temporary, but painful, condition of pre-adolescence.

Punch follows an eight-year-old boy spending a couple of weeks banging around his grandfather’s seaside arcade in the bygone days of some unrevealed year (the 50s or 60s if I had to guess). Original music by Ben Phelps helps set the eerie tone, and Joyce Hutter’s amazing puppets, which range from small-scale to life-size, are works of art that could stand on their own in a gallery.Mr. Particularly noteworthy are Mel Domingo’s lighting, John Nobori’s sound and Joel Daavid’s scenic design, which meshes so perfectly with Brian White’s extraordinary video design that it’s sometimes difficult to tell where the physical set leaves off and the taped images begin. The amazing design elements set a new standard for sub-99-seat theater.

Among the proficient cast, which includes Kerr Seth Lordygan, Don Allen, Miles Taber, Cari Turley and Matthew Ritchey, Silver shines as the doomed Mermaid who finds the path of love as agonizing as does any Hans Christian Andersen heroine. Cawelti, Miles Taber and the company keeps the narrative taut and comprehensible within its surreal context.

Punch, who beats his wife, kills his baby and wrestles with the Devil himself, becomes an object of fascination and dread for the Boy, as real as any human in his bizarre and unsettling new surroundings.īased on a graphic novel by Neil Gaiman illustrated by Dave McKean, this adaptation by director Sean T. Still, some time-honored traditions linger, such as a Punch and Judy show run by a mysterious Professor ( Tom Ashworth). Marginalized by the new medium of television, the once-popular arcade is failing fast.

The Tragical Comedy or Comical Tragedy of Mr. Punch by Neil Gaiman