Swashbuckled

‘Swashbuckled! - the tale of a very curious captain’ Produced by the Spare Parts Puppet Theatre in conjunction with the new WA Maritime Museum, this is a 20-minute educational play, written and directed by Mark Storen. It is showing at the Museum on Victoria Quay in Fremantle ($5 covers entry to museum and play), four performances left on Saturday 20^th October (?).

This wonderful little show – with the big performance by Mark – is designed for children around 8-years old, although the 13-year old boys in the front row lapped it up! As the name suggests, it is the tale of Dampier’s journey to discover the east coast of New Holland. None of these details I knew previously.

In view of Alex Manfrin’s - sorry John Howard’s, I get them mixed up - announcement that schools must teach more history, this type of cameo is exactly what the children will love and more importantly remember. The show has minimal, but effective scenery, fun puppets and a simple sound track. A series of these stories would be very popular touring schools.

On a visit to Canberra there were a series of similar plays performed in the Old Parliament Building, narrating the stories of the people depicted on the Australian currency notes. The details were remembered by our family for years to follow.

Informative, yet fun for all ages.