The milestone 25th Revue of Puppet Theatres will be held from 2 to 10 November and will feature 10 plays and a diverse accompanying programme.

In its 25 years, the Revue has blossomed into an extraordinary international annual event that brings together respected puppeteers and puppet theatres from Croatia and abroad. This year’s Revue offers ten plays, eight from Croatia and one each from Bosnia and Herzegovina and Slovenia. In the year of Rijeka’s tenure as European Capital of Culture, puppeteers from Rijeka had planned to showcase plays from all over the world, but due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Croatian theatres will take centre stage.

Puppeteers from Rijeka will also celebrate two other major jubilees this year – the 60th anniversary of the Rijeka City Puppet Theatre and 100 years of puppetry in Croatia.

At this year’s Revue, both children and adults will be able to enjoy plays by the Theatre Company Pinklec, the Split City Puppet Theatre, the Zadar Puppet Theatre, the Zagreb Puppet Theatre, the Puna Kuća Theatre, the Branko Mihaljević Children’s Theatre from Osijek, the Poco Loco Theatre and the Fort Forno Theatre Troupe.

Since the entire anniversary Revue is centred around the European Capital of Culture Rijeka 2020 project, the ECoC will work together and the Theatre’s long-time collaborators – the Maribor Puppet Theatre from Slovenia and the Mostar Puppet Theatre from Bosnia and Herzegovina – will also be performing. The plays will be staged at the Croatian House of Culture in Sušak and the Rijeka City Puppet Theatre.

This year’s Revue also features two workshops – One Foot in Dancing by the collaborative performance troupe BADco., which will take place at RiHub and Magic Potions in the Opera by Oz Theatre, which will be held at the Rijeka City Puppet Theatre.

The exhibition Puppet Port by Luči Vidanović and Vedrana Balen Spinčić of the Rijeka City Puppet Theatre is scheduled from 3 to 11 November at the Kortil Gallery. The exhibition is a way to say thank you to all the theatres that have performed in previous Revues, especially those that have been a part of this event since the very beginning – the Zagreb City Puppet Theatre, Branko Mihaljević Children’s Theatre in Osijek, the Split City Puppet Theatre, the Zadar Puppet Theatre and, of course, the Rijeka City Puppet Theatre. Stage props and puppets from plays that have delighted both younger and older audiences over the 25 years that the Revue has been held will be displayed at the exhibition.

The books Puppetry Genres on the Stage of the Rijeka City Puppet Theatre and Contemporary Croatian Puppetry by Maja Verdonik and Soul in Matter by Livije Kroflin will also be promoted at the Revue, as will the literature and culture magazine of the Osijek branch of Matica Hrvatske Osijek Book Review – 100 Years of Puppetry in Croatia.

Puppets from the Rijeka City Puppet Theatre’s collections and plays that have been performed at previous Revues of Puppet Theatres will be showcased as part of this year’s Puppets in Windows! project. The creator of the exhibition is Marija Volkmer, and the puppets will be displayed in the windows of the Edit bookstore, Futura Nova, Obuća, Ciciban, Flair, The Next, Torbica, Gant and Five Star Fashion Rijeka.

For further information about the programme and the ticket purchase options, visit the website of the 25th Revue of Puppet Theatres.

The booklet of the 25th Revue of Puppet Theatres is available at this link.