#richard butchins

[thewidowstanton]

Archive feature 2012: Pulling Strings, Frank Mumford, marionettist

To mark the unveiling of our friend Frank Mumford’s most famous puppet – Mademoiselle Zizi, with her accompanist Fyodor – as part of the Victoria and Albert Museum’s permanent collection in London, we are posting this archive feature about him and his wife Maisie, and their amazing showbusiness lives.

By Liz Arratoon

Flicking through my aunt’s Contact the Elderly newsletter, I noticed an old photo of an extremely stylish couple holding two extraordinary puppets. They turned out to be Frank and Maisie Mumford, who, from the 1940s to 1970s, performed with their internationally acclaimed marionette troupe. Though Maisie died in 1985, Frank – now in his nineties – is living in the same tiny London mews flat they shared since 1946. He has lost none of his charm or humour and, with perfect recall, he explains: “My nearest sister, the youngest of three, was ten when I was born, so I was a loner. I grew up with Somerset Maugham and HG Wells’ books and started to create a world of my own.”

Recovering from mumps when he was six, he converted a Maynard’s sweet box into a miniature theatre and, fascinated by cinema, saved up for a Pathe Kid projector and started making films. “I cut a proscenium in the front and had curtains and cut figures out of magazines with hairpins to hold them.” But it was when his English/drama teacher gave him the American puppeteer Tony Sarg’s book, Marionettes and How to Make Them, that his life’s work took off. Originally billed as Master Mumford and His Marionettes – he played London’s Wood Green Empire at 14.

“I had a stand of puppets at the School Boys’ Exhibition at Alexandra Palace from 1933-36. I got a job at Edmonds of Wood Green in display and had a permanent puppet theatre, performing afternoon shows and special ones at Christmas to bring people in. I learnt and learnt and learnt with a captive audience. At about 15 I began to have friends who were professional sculptors, painters and musicians. When I was 16 or 17 we formed the first Puppet Productions and played all London’s small theatres.” From opera to ballet, nothing was beyond their scope.

In 1938 Maisie Tierney joined the troupe, but it disbanded at the outbreak of war in 1939. They married in July 1944, and that September Frank was taken prisoner at Arnhem. “She thought I’d gone for good,” he says. But on his release he joined the Central Pool of Artists and created the two-hour touring show Stars on Strings. After his demob in 1946, they developed a more practical two-handed act. With Frank making all the puppets, hand-carving their wooden heads, their glamorous, fast-paced act was born. “The puppets we’d been using were fine for small theatres. They were about 18” high with seven-foot strings, but to play a place like Hackney Empire, they needed to be bigger, about two feet tall. I designed a bigger head and scaled the body down and it worked.”

They played the Moss Empires’ circuit, top London nightclubs – including Edmundo Ros’ Coconut Grove – and variety shows and cabarets around the world. From the Moulin Rouge to the Casino de Paris, and from the London Palladium to the Sporting Club in Monte Carlo, the Mumfords’ speciality act was there. Before a show the puppets had to be groomed and mechanically set. Roughly nine were used in a music hall or nightclub spot but between 12 and 30 might be needed for plays. Each of their four cabaret spots lasted about 15 minutes, “depending on the applause”, but the shows ran to an hour and 45 minutes.

Ideally the puppets had to be seen from about ten or 15 feet away. The lighting had to exclude the puppeteers’ hands and had to be very powerful, but Frank says proudly: “We had theatre craft, so people didn’t look at us. They applauded the puppets.” He worked constantly on improvements and even changed his shoes to black suede, to eliminate reflections.

A typical cabaret programme would include scenes of different pairs of puppets: two hippos doing a routine, two skeletons doing another, a bullfight, with a bull and a matador, a belly dancer with a man at her feet, Javanese dancers… and then there would be the delectable Zizi, their undoubted star. Introduced in 1947, Mademoiselle Zizi – modelled on Lana Turner and Gypsy Rose Lee – was an instant success. The diminutive chanteuse was always immaculate, with dresses – one designed by Schiaparelli and lined with her trademark shocking pink – made by Frank, who also made her jewellery. Her delicately carved fingers had painted red nails. “After a show in Juans les Pins, her measurements were given in a write-up as 36, 28, 36 and she was named ‘Miss Venus of the Cote d’Azur’,” Frank remembers fondly. But she was also labelled ‘Sex Appeal on Strings’ by the Manchester Herald, and later banned for kissing men in the audience at the Birmingham Hippodrome. Such was the allure of the Mumford puppets!

Indeed, those who fell under Zizi’s spell included another glamorous couple; the Duke and Duchess of Windsor. Frank cites a private party for the Duke’s birthday given by socialite Margaret Thompson Biddle in Paris as their most prestigious date. “Our agent said, ‘We’ve got a booking and we can’t send just anybody. We want someone with style’. She had a beautiful old house on the Left Bank and we did the show in the garden. Afterwards, out of the darkness, the Duke’s equerry emerged and said, ‘The Duke wants to see Zizi again’, so we had to unpack her. The Duke always looked haggard in photos but face-to-face he looked fantastic. He was about 50. Mrs Simpson appeared, too, in a Balmain dress. She wasn’t going to be left out.” The Duke rebooked them six months later for a party he gave in the same house for the Norwegian ambassador.

And at Christmas 1961 they did shows for the royal family, their friends and municipal workers in Monaco. “We arrived on le Train Bleu at 8am and were met by a chauffeur in a Mercedes saloon, which was ours for the week. They had a bijou throne room at the palace. Princess Grace hardly spoke, but Prince Rainier was absolutely easy to chat to. He was the one I had to go to for Zizi to kiss but after about ten shows he got fed up with it.” Later someone asked what Zizi thought of Princess Grace? The answer came: “Well, she’s kissed a prince but I’ve kissed kings.”

I, however, was not the first to unearth the Mumfords’ glittering past. The award-winning film maker Richard Butchins was introduced to Frank by a mutual friend, and finding that he still had all the puppets in his attic – where they’d lain lifelessly for years – and roll upon roll of archive film of their shows and TV appearances, decided to make a documentary. He hopes to finish it by September, depending on finance – the money has come via crowdfunding campaigns on indiegogo – but it hasn’t been easy. Butchins says: “All of their performances on British TV have gone because nothing was archived until the 70s. Basically, the late 40s, 50s and 60s is the part I’m particularly in love with but I’m looking for stuff from Spanish TV in the 50s, and German and Japanese TV in the 70s. I discovered about 20 minutes of film in the French national archives from the late 40s or early 50s, this beautiful black and white film, but they want an absolute fortune to use it.”

Frank describes this as a “smidgen” of their story, which he is documenting in a book, and is determined Maisie should not be forgotten. “It’s come about that it’s all about me, but Maisie contributed an enormous amount. During the bad times you get in showbusiness she was always terribly supportive. She was very beautiful and had charisma in bucketfuls. She had a wonderful personality, like sunshine. We spent 24 hours of every day together and fortunately we were very good friends.”

The renewed interest in their work has, for example, given Frank the chance to see old films he shot for the BBC for the first time. He says: “It’s fantastic, but tiring having to deal with my Beethoven effect.” His hearing may be lost but, thanks to Butchins, Frank and Maisie’s important contribution to the UK’s variety heritage never will be.

Mademoiselle Zizi and Fyodor are on display in the Theatre and Performance Galleries at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London

Sadly, Frank died in 2014, and here’s his obituary in The Sunday Telegraph, also by Liz Arratoon

Pictures: Courtesy of the Frank Mumford Archive

This feature first appeared in The Stage in 2012

[chloerd]

The Disordered Eye

The Disordered Eye - BBC iPlayer

Brendan told us to watch The Disordered Eye on BBC iPlayer, it is about a disabled artist and film-maker Richard Butchins, who investigates whether good vision equals great art. He also investigates modern and historical artists through the lens of their impaired vision. 

Butchins spoke about vision being controlled through our brain and not our eyes and speaks to artists who have impaired vision and how they use their loss of sight as a benefit, to try things they wouldn’t have done before they lost their sight. There are glasses and telescopes you can look into that bring the colour forward and you see the vibrancy within the painting. I think this is such a wonderful idea, of course to people with impaired vision but to anybody, because it reminds us to see the colours and the colourful world that we live in.

Sargy Mann

Sargy Mann. The Point Morning. (2005). Oil on Canvas.

Sargy Mann had lost sight in his eye, he woke up one day and his eye had imploded. He carried on painting and realised he could still paint, and they were beautiful. He had the memory of what he had seen.

Edgar Degas

Edgar Degas. (1896). La Coiffure (Combing the Hair).

Edgar Degas said “Only when he no longer knows what he is doing does the painter do good things.” Having impaired vision doesn’t mean you can’t do art; it just means you might not be able to put as much detail in a painting.

Aaron McPeake

Aaron McPeake. (1985 & 2015). Measurement. Digital Print on Aluminium.

Aaron McPeake has got a hole in the centre of his vision, so if he looks at some directly, their face disappears. He took the sighting chart that everybody is familiar with and turned it into what he can see. He is inspired by the Buddhist bell; he makes everyday objects out of bronze so they can be hit and creates a sound. He said he does this because people make assumptions that people with impaired vision must be interested in sound, but he is not.

 Robert Morris

 Robert Morris. (1973-2000) Blind Time Drawing.

He drew pictures with his eyes shut, in the second series he co-opted a blind woman, he anonymised and then argued with her about a variety of things including perspective. He would say “things get smaller as they get further away” and she would say “no they don’t”. She had signed a confidentiality contract so she couldn’t share any details regarding it. Morris had a stereotypical view of blind people and had the opportunity to change those views but didn’t. Her name was Adrienne Asch.

Richard Butchins volunteered to model for the disable life class where people with impaired vision would draw Butchins, they made a sculpture of him before he went in the room and the leader of the class described his appearance in full detail so they could draw off his description. Butchins then described himself to help give more detail. People then drew Butchins in their own way, either by drawing, painting, or sculpture. It was interesting to see how each person captured Butchins appearance with touch, feel, and how they interpreted him in their brain.

“The loss of one’s scene of ability, could improve one’s artistic ability.” 

Claude Monet

Claude Monet. (1899). Waterlilies and Japanese Bridge. Oil on Canvas.

Claude Monet had cataracts in both eyes. He avoided operations because he was worried that it would alter his perception of colour. Blurred glimpse and visions of light, his paintings are well known and incredibly beautiful.

Keith Salmon

Keith Salmon. Breaking Mists – Isle of Arran

Scottish landscapes, he absorbs the experience of the places he goes. The sounds, smells, what he feels and tastes in the air. So that when he draws the landscape, he captures the space and the environment he is drawing/painting.

Sally Booth

Sally Booth. Bluecoat Studio Windows No. 4 Top (Landscape).

Sally Booth. Railway and Red Buildings.

Sally Booth can see badly in both eyes. She uses a camera; she uses it like a notebook/sketchbook. She doesn’t see herself as a photographer, she just takes photographs. She doesn’t use the photographs to make paintings/drawings, she just uses them alongside her work. She has cataracts so Monet’s paintings speak to her and helped her in her paintings.

Neil Harbisson

Neil Harbisson. Visualisation of Beethoven’s Für Elise.

Neil Harbisson has an inability to see colour and sees everything in black and white, so he has an “eyeborg” implanted in his head that allows him to hear colour. The antennae detects the dominant colour in front of him, it sends the frequency of the dominant colour into the back of his head and inside his head there is something that beeps depending on the dominant colour. He is now experimenting with a compass in his knee.

[christianworldf]

New Post has been published on Christian Worldview Institute

New Post has been published on https://christianworldviewinstitute.com/bible-prophecies/end-time-events/book-of-daniel/kent-hovind-vs-science-textbooks-part-1/

Kent Hovind vs Science Textbooks [PART 1]

Today we’re looking at Kent Hovind’s “book” Are You Being Brainwashed?: Propaganda in Science Textbooks. In this first part we find out why Kent dislikes evolution so much, he completely butchers it’s definition and we see the first of many many many strawmans.

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[bradfordzone]

Dwarfs In Art: A New Perspective | BBC Four 20 August 9:00pm

Dwarfs In Art: A New Perspective | BBC Four 20 August 9:00pm

How have the lives of dwarfs changed over centuries, as seen through paintings, sculptures and photography? And what do these representations reveal, not only about people with dwarfism, but about society itself?

Presented by Richard Butchins, himself a disabled filmmaker, artist and writer, this documentary explores the representation of dwarfs, as seen through art, from being seen as figures of…

[yesartpress]

Richard Butchins 'Pavement: Thoughts of a Serial Killer'

A NEW fictional serial killer is prowling the streets of Islington and Camden. Pavement: Thoughts of a Serial Killer began as author Richard Butchins’ suicide note; his words on the futility of existence pushed him to write more and, eventually, to reconsider his own life. 

The Holloway resident’s macabre debut novel tethers itself to reality with detailed descriptions of actual north London streets and sights. You may have spotted the book title, sprayed in red paint, the letters bleeding into the towpath at various points from Camden Lock to the Islington tunnel. 

“Smith” is the isolated anti-hero, compelled by boredom and obsession to leave his dingy bedsit in Essex Road and trudge the capital’s streets counting paving slabs and fantasising about brutal murders. Smith develops a taste for blood after he is repels a would-be attacker and kills him in the process.  

For Richard – a documentary filmmaker and disability rights activist – the gruesome violence is not the focus of the book; instead it’s a study of the contemporary values that drive Smith to feel invisible and unaccountable. 

“A theme that runs through the book is the idea that the only value society gives people is a socio-economic status so if you’ve got no money then you’ve got no value,” says Richard. “He has to validate himself as having some sort of power and some sort of strength in society so what he does is he kills someone, which is kind of the ultimate taboo crossed. I do try and address certain philosophical and moral issues within the book. There’s a scene when he is disposing a body in the Regent’s Canal and wondering if everyone knew he was wandering around with bits of a body in a bag they would be really horrified. But what’s the difference between that and a soldier? The sanction, that’s the difference.”

As Smith struggles to delineate between reality and his vivid daydreams – both are described in almost pornographic detail – Richard somehow manages to humanise him. One of his aims had been to sneak under the “monster” stereotype perpetuated by snappy media headlines. Parallels have, unsurprisingly, been drawn with Bret Easton Ellis’ icy serial killer in American Psycho, but while Patrick Bateman’s 80s yuppie lifestyle is far removed from many readers, Richard’s Smith lives among us, travelling from Essex Road to Holborn. 

“It’s a real place, it’s my intimate knowledge of Camden down to Bloomsbury,” he says. “I have walked those streets for years and years, I’ve known the canal for 25 years, Camden Market, the Black Cat factory in Mornington Crescent, all those things I know and are real.” 

The setting may be instantly recognisable but this doesn’t bring comfort and the conspicuous absence of police or justice makes Pavement a difficult read. “It isn’t a traditional crime novel where a fiendishly clever serial killer is being pursued by a flawed but worthwhile detective who finally catches him,” he says. “But there are no detectives in this, all those things that you frame that sort of novel in  in order to keep people feeling safe and comfortable, the villain always get caught in the end, well, they don’t actually. 

“Nine times out of 10 clever criminals never get caught, the ones who do are the stupid ones.”

There is a tangible element of personal release for Richard in Pavement, you can sense how much of his own political views have fed into the “Smith” character, admittedly influenced by the first-person, present-tense narration. 

“The line between fact and fiction was further blurred as, armed with a measuring tape, he physically enacted Smith’s OCD, counting his steps and noting the different materials of paving slabs, even conducting thorough research – as does Smith in his local library – into the best manner with which to dismember victims.

When I mention screenwriter Barrie Keeffe wore Doc Marten boots and listened to Dylan’s Hurricane in order to write the lines of sadistic police officers in Sus, Richard stresses his was more a mental process, unleashing his imagin­ation to dive into Smith’s more extreme thoughts and actions: “I think it was a bit disconcerting to allow myself to think that sort of stuff and then instead of stopping myself, letting myself go with the thought and see where it took me.” 

While Richard is keen for readers to connect with the book – his dream is for people to visit the areas mentioned in Pavement – he wants people to find it a difficult and emotional experience. 

“If you watch a horror film it’s a kind of a passive experience imaginatively because the imagining has been done for you,” he says. 

“When you read a book it’s active imagining, you’re involved in creating the story. That’s why reading books is really dangerous.”

• Pavement: Thoughts of a Serial Killer. By Richard Butchins. Cutting Edge Press (£8.99) www.cuttingedgepress.co.uk

*First published in the Camden New Journal, West End Extra and Islington Tribune

[chloerd]

The Disordered Eye

Brendan told us to watch The Disordered Eye on BBC iPlayer, it is about a disabled artist and film-maker Richard Butchins, who investigates whether good vision equals great art. He also investigates modern and historical artists through the lens of their impaired vision.