ABOUT
Green Ginger is an international theatre company based in UK. Founded by Terry Lee in 1978, it creates memorable experiences for worldwide audiences through highly visual and accessible productions, and offers training, teaching and puppetry solutions for TV, film and stage…
NEWS
NEWS
JAMES OSBORNE 1961 - 2024
We are sad to be saying goodbye to an old friend and trusted collaborator after a long illness. James/Jamie was ‘family’ in many ways; he was founder Terry Lee’s brother-in-law, and became Green Ginger’s touring technician from 1994 until 2007. He was instrumental in the way technologies were woven into the company’s work. His unique mind delighted in the absurd, and this, with a passion for reviving and recycling old equipment, helped to shape our visual and sonic languages, and became no small part in Green Ginger’s theatre-making practices.
Jamie’s contributions to Frank Einstein, Slaphead - Demon Barber, Bambi - The Wilderness Years, and Rust have shaped the ways we still embrace the digital with lo-fi, and try to promote a working culture of repair, recycling and repurposing with all of the assets and tools we employ. We will miss his creative, chaotic and curious mind, his love of music from all corners of the planet, and his essential humanity. Our thoughts are with his family.
NEW VIDEO ADDED - THE REGENERATOR
This short film is the result of a long collaboration between creative robotics company Rusty Squid and Green Ginger - one that lasted a decade. Cinematography by Adam Laity, design and fabrication by Green Ginger and Rusty Squid.
COLLABORATIONS INVITED - WATCH VIDEO BELOW
Green Ginger welcomes enquiries from anyone curious about the possibilities and potential of puppetry solutions of any scale. Use our contact page link below and message us with your enquiry.
BIRTHMARKED @EDINBURGH FRINGE 2023
“It’s a show that reminds us that British independent companies are currently redefining what musical theatre might be with energising results. The hand of director Sally Cookson is often revealed in the simplicity of the staging, and some beguiling moments of puppetry courtesy of puppet director Chris Pirie. More of the latter please.”
Lyn Gardner THE STAGE
COLDPLAY WORLD TOUR 2023
Artistic Director Chris Pirie has just returned home from performing in front of over 350,000 people as a puppeteer on Coldplay’s current World Tour; Music of the Spheres. He and five other puppeteers join the band onstage for Biutyful; the last song of the set. The puppeteers played a fictional band of alien musicians called The Weirdos, and had the joys of performing with a set of amazing puppets created in LA by Jim Henson Creature Shop. The 6-night UK leg of the tour visited Ethihad Stadium in Manchester, followed by Cardiff’s Principality Stadium.
The puppetry team was led by tour regular Nicolette Santini performing Angel Moon, alongside a collective of Bristol-based puppetry practitioners: Cat Rock and Ben Mars on The Wizard, Flo Scott and Alistair Fleming keeping the drummer Donk on the beat, and Chris puppeteered the monkey guitarist Sparkman. The Bristol team was ably supported by puppet wrangler Izzy Bristow, another colleague from Puppet Place.
PINOCCHIO @Unicorn Theatre, London
Chris Pirie & Izzy Bristow have been working their magic in the design and fabrication of puppetry for Unicorn’s Christmas show. Directed by Justin Audibert from Eve Leigh’s script, and with effective puppetry and movement direction from the dependable Laura Cubitt, Green Ginger’s puppets have shaped one of the production’s most memorable scenes.
"The puppetry, designed by Chris Pirie and directed by Laura Cubitt, soars in the second half, eliciting screams of delighted terror when a giant dogfish puppet lunges at the audience..." The Stage
Video link for the trailer for Unicorn Theatre’s Pinocchio (2022)
TAKING ACTION & MAKING A DIFFERENCE
We’re living in a climate crisis. The Theatre Green Book encourages the theatreworld to work more sustainably. If theatre is to be part of the most vital conversation humanity faces, then it has to change its practice. The Theatre Green Book sets out the path to a sustainable future. Green Ginger has registered its current production RATLab as a trial using The Green Book.
The company also uses CG Tools; a Carbon Calculator available by Julie’s Bicycle to record and assess its environmental impact and footprint across all of its activities.
NEW CONTENT ADDED: FRANK EINSTEIN & SLAPHEAD
Check out the expanded PAST SHOWS page here. We have added the first two indoor theatre we created in the mid-1990s After some years growing a reputation as one of Europe’s noisiest and funniest puppetry-based street theatre companies, Green Ginger decided to come in from the cold with a trilogy of shows that took classic literary source material and turned it on its head, with healthy doses of visual and comedic absurdity. The updated page now features info, press quotes and photos from Frank Einstein (1993), Slaphead (1996), and Bambi; The Wilderness Years (2000).
AWARD-WINNING RATLAB GOES LIVE IN 2024!
RATLab was recently recognised with University of Bath’s VC’s IMPACT Award for Public Engagement. The pilot project, created in 2021 by Green Ginger in partnership with University of Bath’s Bio-Mechanical Engineers, and with funding from Royal Academy of Engineering, will be delivered back into primary schools in areas of deprivation and low arts engagement in Spring Term 2024. The project, funded by Arts Council England and Orthopaedic Research UK, is an innovative schools intervention in a bespoke pop-up environment and is designed to challenge negative associations with engineering and reframe it as an exciting study and career path.
Social
Instagram
Twitter