The Bob Baker Marionette Theater was about to debut its first new production in 45 years, and it wasn't clear if one of the show's new signature puppets would work. One pelican, with a huge cube-shaped beak, needed last-minute maintenance.
This gangly bird, designed to leap, leap, soar and sing Clarence Henry's mid-'50s blues and rhythm hit, “Ain't Got No Home,” was supposed to surprise audiences, as its elongated beak actually hides a frog. Getting the pelican and frog duo to perform in unison was a feat of mechanical artistry for the team, not to mention the choreography required by the puppeteer.
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And in the minutes before the show, director Alex Evans was trying to stay calm. In such moments, he would later say, he need only remember an old adage about the puppet arts.
“Puppets,” he says, “break all the time.”
With that, I was ready to embrace the unknown.
“I always say I love the chaos of live theater,” Evans says. “We have to believe in this.”
“Choo Choo Revue,” the latest in a long line of song and dance productions, comes at a momentous time for the Bob Baker Marionette Theatre. Last month, the company announced its intention to purchase its venue on York Boulevard in Highland Park for $5 million, doing so while preparing for performances at the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival. The latter went viral, a fact Evans attributes to many of the shows in the first week of “Choo Choo Revue” being sold out.
An organist plays as people attend the premiere of “Choo Choo Revue” at the Bob Baker Marionette Theatre.
In many ways, “Choo Choo Revue” is a statement piece. Evans, who also serves as co-executive director with Mary Fagot, wants to put the spotlight on the current generation of theater artists, makers and contributors. While the show pays tribute in many ways to the theater's legendary eponymous founder, perhaps most notably in the use of his vintage record collection, it is time, Evans says, for the next generation of the Bob Baker Marionette Theater to shine.
Evans was instrumental in the decision to move the team away from the previously announced production of “The Arabian Nights,” a project once spearheaded by Baker, who died in 2014. Just before the arrival of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, the theater had gotten a program of “The Arabian Nights” into print and had the sets and puppets ready to go.
“Choo Choo Revue” is Bob Baker’s first new puppet show since “Hooray LA!” of 1981.
However, during the forced closure, the team began to rethink its future. “It was a deeply inspiring moment to think internally about who we are and what we want to prioritize,” says Evans, who joined the company in 2007 as a volunteer and became a staff member in 2009.
“The first new show in 40 years – finishing one of Bob's shows would have been deeply personal and meaningful, but it would have maintained the narrative, internally and externally, that it was one person's vision,” Evans says. “'Choo Choo' is a culmination of so many different ideas and people. It was about purposefully opening the floodgates, that Bob Baker could be more than just the Bob Baker person.”
It was not certain that the Bob Baker Puppet Theater would reach this milestone. For much of the last decade, roughly since the death of the theater's patriarch, the narrative surrounding the theater was one of survival.
In 2019, the Bob Baker Puppet Theater needed a lifeline. Forced to abandon its home on the outskirts of downtown for more than 55 years, the beloved company with its thousands of hand-made puppets (a sassy black cat in heels, a fish out of water that can't help but move) finally found a new location in a Highland Park theater, where it signed a 10-year lease.
Then came the pandemic, when the theater relied heavily on community fundraising to cover rent. California, and Hollywood in particular, has a rich tradition of puppetry. The Bob Baker Marionette Theater likes to refer to itself as the largest operating puppet theater in the U.S. The oldest puppet space in the country is located north of Oakland, at Children's Fairyland amusement park. And in 2020, Bob Baker discovered that he had a large following and at one point asked to raise $365,000 over the course of a year. He did it in four weeks.
1. L Castro spins a puppet. 2. The audience applauds after the premiere of “Choo Choo Revue.” 3. People line up for the premiere of “Choo Choo Revue” at the Bob Baker Marionette Theatre. (Carlin Stiehl/for The Times)
Old favorites, including the theater's famous black cat puppet, appear in “Choo Choo Revue.”
But it was the long process of buying his home — that is, the belief that he would be in Highland Park to stay — that gave the company confidence that it could move forward with a new show. The obvious question, of course, is why it took 40 years to have a completely new Bob Baker experience. Evans gives a long answer, pointing out numerous obstacles, whether it be the change of location, the cost of preserving his historic puppets and collection, as well as managing priorities.
“It's not necessarily a financial hurdle,” Evans says, noting that “Choo Choo Revue” cost $300,000, with about half of that going into creating new puppets and sets.
“I think it was more about priorities,” Evans says. “For example, do we give medical attention to the staff first, or do we do a new show first? So, do we give medical attention to the staff. Or give the stage better lighting.”
As for how and why the team decided on “Choo Choo Revue” as their first production since “Hooray LA!” 1981, Evans says not to think too much about it.
“It made me laugh,” he says. “It was a departure into the imagination. 'Choo Choo Revue', because of the name itself, I thought I would laugh.”
The show is a fantastic depiction of a cross-country train journey, filled with adorable puppet trains.
A meticulously detailed trunk with windows, for example, or a car that seems to balance natural, mountainous wonders on its rear. They're colorful toys, at least until the background scenery starts depicting various styles of locomotives. Puppeteers will bring out open-air train cars, each of which often houses a fantastical creature: a moose, for example, who takes a break from knitting to prance to a rendition of the traditional blues song “Midnight Special.”
Behind all this are tens of thousands of hours of craftsmanship. Each new puppet is a work of art. Take, for example, a swarm of bats that appeared to glow in the dark (the creatures, created for “Choo Choo Revue,” made their debut during last year's Halloween season).
The Bob Baker Marionette Theater created more than 100 new puppets for “Choo Choo Revue,” including a pelican hiding a frog in its beak.
Or an intricately detailed band of cicadas. Each of them plays tiny instruments: one, a half-open can of sardines, another, a box of matches. Its wings deserve a close inspection, as the translucent curved accessories are inspired by stained glass. There are tree skiing and training whistles with big lips and high heels, modeled after the Andrews Sisters harmony group. Wait for the latter to be revealed, as each of the 100 new puppets is full of surprises.
“We brought together a bunch of different artists and we all bounced ideas off each other,” Evans says of the creation process. “Like, 'Let's all think for a second about anthropomorphizing trains.' We made a bunch of sketches and showed them to each other. Honestly, I probably have a thousand different, fascinating ideas about train movement.”
On opening night, the crowd applauds the numbers, cheering with delight as each new piece of fantasy rolls or rises above the stage. And as for the spectacular pelican, the frog pops out of its beak right on cue, a moment that actually inspires a round of laughter and childlike wonder.
As the imaginary train takes the puppets across the country, the show manages to generate anticipation simply by making the crowd wonder what comes next. Say, for example, a fluffy sasquatch or a singing moon in pajamas singing an old-fashioned lullaby to all the little ones sitting cross-legged on the floor.
Puppeteer Ginger Duncan spins a puppet named Comedy.
Much of “Choo Choo Revue,” like the yawning moon and serenade, has its roots in the music of the past. That was a decision made to ensure the show was in line with Bob Baker's previous work. However, Evans says that after Coachella the team is encouraged to start tackling more contemporary songs at their Highland Park headquarters. The crowd at the Indio festival, for example, went wild with puppets swooning to Ben Platt's cover of Addison Rae's hit, “Diet Pepsi.”
“Honestly, if we had done Coachella last year, it would have pushed 'Choo Choo' even more,” he says, noting that he initially feared that pop music would be distracting. “I didn't think it could work in a way that wouldn't kick you out of the program.”
And yet, Evans doesn't want to get ahead of himself. She was close to tears at the end of the “Choo Choo Revue” premiere, and the next afternoon said that seeing this show come together after several years was second only to her wedding in 2025 in terms of creating an “overwhelming feeling of pride, love and care.”
“Choo Choo Revue” culminates with a look to the future. That's when a sleek, oversized, silver high-speed bullet train arrives on the scene.
It can be read as a metaphor.
While the nonprofit is still seeking help from donors (at the premiere, Fagot said the company has now secured $4.7 million toward its $5 million goal of purchasing the theater and also hopes to raise an additional $2 million for building improvements), its future is more secure than at any time over the past decade.
Finally, the Bob Baker Puppet Theater can relax and look toward new horizons.
Evans, for example, can't help but excitedly tease a possible upcoming Bob Baker show. In the interview he says twice that the Olympic Games are on the company's mind.
“We have two years,” he says. And now the permanent home to house it.
