Jerusalem’s annual puppet festival aims to lighten the mood

Jerusalem’s annual International Puppet Festival, celebrating its 34th year from August 17-21, opens Sunday at the Train Theater in Liberty Bell Park, with organizers hoping to provide some normalcy to a war-battered public.

The five-day event includes an outdoor complex of games and activities, an interactive circus, and dozens of puppet shows and plays performed in the spaces of the Karon Theater complex.

The festival is hosting a mix of local and some visiting performers. Most of the Israeli works are in Hebrew, but often use very few words, making them accessible to both younger and non-Hebrew-speaking audiences.

There are also several shows geared for older audiences, scattered throughout the days of the festival.

The directors and creators behind the festival have been thinking about Israeli children and their current reality, wrote CEO Kobi Frig and artistic director Shahar Marom in their announcement.

“A country whose children sit in bomb shelters, where school stops and starts, where parents worry about how to protect their children while allowing them to have a normal childhood,” wrote Frig and Marom.

“We, too, at the Train Theater and at the 34th International Puppet Festival, are constantly thinking about this, and trying our best, together with our artists, to create an artistic and cultural reality for children, to strengthen them and help them heal,” added Frig and Marom.

One of the performances is a stage adaptation of the book, “The Heart Shaped Leaf” by Shira Geffen (daughter of Yonatan Geffen, sister of Aviv Geffen and married to Etgar Keret).

The award-winning stage work was co-adapted and directed by Zvi Sahar and designed by illustrator and animator David Polonsky, who also illustrated the book.

The puppet show is geared for children aged three to six, and will be performed on August 21, at 12 p.m. and 3 p.m.

Another worthwhile performance is the adaptation of the story “A Sick Day for Amos McGee” by Philip C. Stead, illustrated by Erin A. Steed.

The play is celebrating its tenth anniversary, with performances in Israel and around the world.

There will also be outdoor performances at the festival, including several by the Circus School of the Train Theater, which combines circus techniques of balance, aerial acrobatics and juggling and clowning segments, some performed by local children who study at the circus school.

For more information, tickets and times, go to the Train Theater website.