The Process of Writing a Puppet Script

Our Pastimes reports:

"Writing puppet scripts for children can be a challenge, but it can also be fun. Sometimes children are hard to please, but if you write skits that you believe are entertaining and interesting[,] chances are[,] your audience will too. The following steps will help you create a puppet script. Know your audience and know what you can or cannot write about...Know the characters that will be in your play. Look at what you have to work with and write your script around that. Pick a main character (protagonist) from among the puppets you have in your selection. Choose a bad guy (an antagonist) who will make life hard for your hero. When choosing this character, which can be a boy, girl or animal, make sure it is one that is believable in appearance...Come up with a plot. Along with who your character is, you need to know what your play is about, where it is happening and what is wrong. Your character must desire something, but is unable to get it for some reason. Come up with some humor. Children love slapstick humor and lots of animation. Make it fun and exaggerate everything to the hilt. Practice your skit with your puppets. Check out their expressions as you go through the play which will give you inspiration. Use improvisation...Try to avoid preachy language or [long-winded] dialogue. Make your skit full of action and try not to let the scenes in your script be [stagnant]. The most important rule in creating a puppet skit is to make it fun and enjoyable...Make you[r] characters distinctive and exaggerate their flaws or features. Name your characters according to their quirks...Incorporate music into your play if possible, especially at the beginning and at the end. Print your skit so it is readable to those performing it. Design the outline in a script format and make the names of the characters in large capital letters...Keep things simple. Don't go overboard with props. Write the scenes so that your puppeteers aren't climbing all over each other to get here and there. Practice and run through everything to make sure it is easy and doable for the performers."