site.btaSnow White and Seven Dwarfs Puppet Show Premieres in Burgas

Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs will premiere at the State Puppet Theatre in Burgas on January 8, the puppet show's author and director Iroslav Petkov told BTA on Wednesday.

The biggest surprise and challenge in this show is how two actors alone manage to manipulate the seven dwarfs at the same time, along with playing other characters of the classic fairy tale by the Brothers Grimm. Petkov noted that the audience will also be surprised by the solutions about the puppets and the sets which he, as a director, has reached together with the set and costume designer Maria Ibrishimova.

"With Maria Ibrishimova we first create the sketches and the vision of the performance, then we go ahead with the production of the entire set and all the puppets, the characters' costumes, as well as the actors' costumes. We start from scratch and complete everything ourselves 100%", Petkov explained, adding that this way of working is often easier than having to explain his ideas about the movements of the puppets to someone else.

"We didn't sidestep the classic fairy tale, on the contrary, we consciously tried to get as close as possible to the story that is familiar to everyone, both children and adults," the director said. Still, the dwarves do not have names in the puppet show which, according to the director, also has its logical explanation. "According to researchers of fairy tales and especially the work of the Brothers Grimm, it is not accidental that most of the characters have no names. The main character usually has a name, as in the case of Snow White, while the queen stepmother and the dwarfs are nameless. This is intentional because in this way children can more easily identify with the main character," Petkov pointed out.

He noted that as old as classic fairy tales may be, they still convey universal human values that reach children today. "Although we cannot escape from our time of high technology, children continue to like fairy tales and it is no coincidence that they want them to be read to them not once, but hundreds of times," Petkov stressed, adding that few people realize that Snow White is deceived three times by the evil stepmother, and the dwarves warn her four times not to trust. "In my opinion, this is another important message that subconsciously reaches children," the director said.

Alexandra Eneva and Ivaylo Enev, the two actors who appear as all the characters in the play, have drawn several lessons from Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. One has to do with envy. "Unfortunately, we find it more and more often in the hearts of people whom we encounter in our daily lives. We wish that this malice and envy would melt and kindness would prevail," Eneva said. For Enev, the example set by the seven dwarfs is also very valuable. "Some cute little dwarves work from dawn to dusk, they don't cope with the daily routine but keep their pure hearts and help. It would be great if we don't forget that we are human and that it is beautiful to help each other," commented the actor.

After the January 8 opening night, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs will be performed again in Burgas on January 11 and 12.