The Stage
will be a piece of plain solid-colored cloth, which must reach across an open doorway, be tacked upon each side and extend down to the floor, where it should be again fastened that there may be no danger of its blowing aside. Put this curtain up high enough in the doorway to reach a trifle above your head, for you must be completely hidden from the audience. The full-page illustration shows the back of the stage and gives the manner in which Punch and his family are made to move about in the opening between the top of the doorway and the curtain. It is this opening which constitutes the stage. The illustration also shows a band of cloth stretched across the extreme top of the doorway, and short side curtains added to the outside of the stage to improve its appearance.
Fig. 42.—Draw Punch’s head like this.
To Make Punch’s Head,
cut a piece of unruled white writing-paper eight inches long and five inches wide, to allow a generous margin, and on it draw [Fig. 42], making the head 6 inches across one way and 4 inches the other. Paste a strip of thin cloth over the neck which includes the entire space between the four corners marked A-A-A-A, and over this cloth paste two more cloth strips in the spaces marked B-B and B-B. The cloth strengthens the neck and prevents it from tearing while the head is in motion. Carefully mark the features, copying them also on the right-hand side of the face (D). Cut out the head, including flaps, and the ears along their outer edge. Cut the line of the chin into each side of the neck as far as the second strips of cloth (B-B and B-B). Roll the neck until it fits loosely on your first finger, then paste it together like a ring. Paste the tips of each side of the nose together, also those of the chin.
Behind the Scenes in the Doorway Punch and Judy Show.