Ludden Memorial Library was the scene of Dan Grady’s Marvelous Marionette Medley.
By Terry Karkos
Staff Writer

DIXFIELD – A garishly-garbed clown proved Friday that he didn’t need a circus to show off his daring skills as a tightrope walker.

A stage, high wire set, appropriate music and a captive audience with no strings attached were among his only requirements at Ludden Memorial Library.

The tall, fluorescent green-haired clown marionette, however, required strings and a handler to bring it to life while 25 adults and 40 children admired the work of master puppeteer Dan Grady of Eliot.

Grady’s Marvelous Marionette Medley lived up to its billing as a captivating, enchanting, fast-paced stringed puppet production at the library’s Laugh It Up At Your Library Summer Reading Program awards program.

Prior to the entertainment segment of his 60-minute show, Grady, 51, explained how he read many books in libraries to learn how to construct marionettes and with them, mimic human behavior.

Grady then demonstrated where the controlling strings attach to the doll, adeptly lifting, pushing and pulling the cords. His movements above, beside and behind the doll created the illusion of life, as jointed limbs and body parts moved fluidly in unison.

“If I pull the hand string up like this, he’s under arrest,” Grady said as a buck-toothed marionette reached for the sky and the crowd erupted with laughter.

And then the show began as the puppet master paraded out a complex set of characters, each with their own entertainment routine set to lively music.

There was a lithe leprechaun that hopped off the stage and hugged all the children, a daring young man on a flying trapeze, and two monkeys named after Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers who danced around the stage as if they’d been doing it all their lives.

Additional marionettes included a country music superstar, guitar-playing, gray cat named Conway Kitty that was outfitted in a cowboy hat, red kerchief, leather boots and vest, and a yellow-stalked, orange-spotted blue mushroom with a face, animated arms and hands.

Others included a large unicycle-riding dog that flew around the room, ghostly clowns with heads that danced detached from their bodies and a 10-pound Humphrey Dumpty clown (Humpty’s cousin).

After the show, library assistants Peggy Malley and Diane Stanley handed out awards and prizes to the top children in several age groups, those who read the most books during the program’s duration..

Becca Dailey and Zoe Tacheny tied for first in the pre-kindergarten class, reading 91 books each.

Sara Van Lieu took top honors for the first and second grade level, Ruanne Dailey topped the list of third- and fourth-grade competitors, Britni Hutchinson won first place for fifth- and sixth-graders, and Molly Van Lieu won the seventh-grade and up competition.

tkarkos@sunjournal.com

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