While there are many ways to change your appeal to your audience, here is one way that seems to work very well when used by really good Vents.
We are all familiar with individual Vents who go before their audience with a puppet, we are also aware that some really good Vents can get up with TWO puppets and really get the crowd rolling. One of the best ways to do this is to have two puppets that have somewhat argumentative personalities with each other. One example is Peanut and Walter, who seemingly don’t care for each other and are always taking snips at each other.
How about if you had a sister and brother that could always take “friendly” cheep shots at each other as the exhibit their dislike for each other with sibling rivalry.
There are as many different ways to come up with a pair of antagonistic personalities as there are personalities to work with. Be original in your efforts to create your signature act, but even in your originality just know that if you have one character that plays the straight guy while the other is the smart aleck that you can come up with a new act that will do well with your audience.
You can begin to practice with any two puppets that you have. All you will need in the beginning is to make sure that you have two voices and two personalities for your puppets. Then you must also have your own voice so that you can moderate the “arguments” between the two antagonists. As you proceed, you may come to realize that you don’t yet have the perfect combination of puppets for this type of act, but you will also have the time to figure out the type of puppet(s) that you need to pull off this type of act. That of course is where The Dummy Shoppe may be able to help you come up with just the right combination of puppets to revamp your act and pull this off. Think about it then try to see what happens when you use two puppets that you already have. Work on it and see where it goes for you.
We will talk again next week,
Steve and JET