Hello, my name's Gilbert and I'm a puppeteer from the Little Angel Theatre,
and today I'm going to tell you a version of the story Pinocchio,
using some things that I found lying around the house. So here we go.
Once, there lived an old carpenter called Geppetto, and Geppetto lived all by himself
in a tiny house on the edge of a town. One day, Geppetto was out in the forest - "Oh, what a lovely day, hello.
Ooh, what have we got down here, then?" And he found a really nice old piece of wood and he said to himself,
"I'll take that home with me and I'll carve a nice little puppet boy to live with me so he can keep me company."
So Geppetto took the piece of wood home, and with a chisel, he carved himself a puppet boy.
He carved a head and a body with arms and legs, but as he did, the puppet's nose grew longer, and longer,
and longer. "Hmm ... I'll call you Pinocchio," said Geppetto. But just as he did, Pinocchio leapt to his feet
and ran out of the door towards the town. "Come back here, puppet boy!" cried Geppetto,
but Pinocchio shouted back, "I'm not a puppet boy, I'm a real boy!"
Just then, Geppetto ran past a policeman with a big moustache. "'Ello, 'ello, 'ello, what we got here, then?"
And because Geppetto was chasing Pinocchio with a chisel in his hand,
the policeman thought he looked a bit dangerous, so he decided to put him in prison for the night.
Pinocchio ran all the way home, and settled down in the armchair by the fire. He was just drifting off to sleep
when he heard ... Pinocchio looked down and on his leg there was an ancient old cricket bug,
and the cricket said to Pinocchio, "If you're naughty, puppet, you'll never get to be a real boy."
But Pinocchio took no notice of him, and he drifted off to sleep. But as he slept,
the heat from the fire caused his legs to burn all the way down.
The next day, Geppetto arrived back from the prison and went, "Oh, there you are!"
Pinocchio was looking very sorry for himself, and he said to Geppetto, "Father, I'm sorry for running away.
I just want to be a real boy." Geppetto had a think. "Hmm, well, if you promise to be good, I'll send you to school,
and I'll carve you a new pair of legs." Pinocchio promised to be good, but, as he did, his nose grew longer,
and longer, and longer. Geppetto sold his overcoat so that he had enough money
to buy Pinocchio a school book and the next morning, he waved him off as Pinocchio skipped off to school.
But as Pinocchio was passing through the town square, he saw a big colourful tent,
and the sign outside said, Travelling Puppet Show". Pinocchio really wanted to have a look,
so he sold his school book and with the money, he bought himself a ticket, raced into the circus
and got himself a front row seat, and there were all kinds of wonderful puppets. There were marionettes
and rod puppets and glove puppets and shadow puppetry, and at the end of the show,
one of the puppets in the show came up to Pinocchio and said,
"Hello. Would you like to join our puppet show?" and Pinocchio said, "Oh, yes please, that would be lovely."
"We're all orphans," said the other puppet. "Have you got any family?"
"Oh, no, no, no, I haven't got any family at all," lied Pinocchio,
and as he did, his nose got longer, and longer, and longer.
Pinocchio performed with the puppet show for weeks and they toured around the country,
going from town to town. And then one day as he was taking his bow, he heard a familiar sound.
It was the ancient old cricket, who landed on Pinocchio's shoulder and said,
"Your father's been terribly worried about you. He's been searching for you everywhere,
and he's just about to set sail in his rowing boat to go all the way across the ocean to try and find you."
Pinocchio felt very sad, and as he did his nose ... became shorter, and shorter, and shorter.
Pinocchio raced off to the shore, and when he got there, he could see a tiny speck on the horizon,
which was his father in the rowing boat. "Oh, I'm never gonna reach him now." But just as he said that,
a pigeon appeared down by his feet. [BIRD COOS] "If you like you could jump on my back,
and I'll fly you all the way out to your father." [GASPS] "Would you do that for me, pigeon?"
"Oh, yes." [BIRD COOS] So Pinocchio jumped on the pigeon's back and off they went.
But just as they were drawing near, a big, dark shadow appeared under Geppetto's boat, and all of a sudden -
[INHALES AND SWALLOWS] - a mouth jumped out of the ocean,
and swallowed Geppetto and his rowing boat whole. Pinocchio dived off the pigeon's back into the ocean,
and before he knew what had happened - [INHALES AND SWALLOWS] -
the big mouth swallowed Pinocchio as well, and they were both inside a whale.
Pinocchio slid down all sorts of slimy tunnels and tubes, until finally he landed - THUD! - in the whale's belly.
"Ouch!" cried a voice. "Father, is that you?"
"Yes! Oh, Pinocchio, my lad, I found you, finally." "Well, I found you too, Father."
"I know, we found each other! But how are we gonna get out of this tummy?" Pinocchio had an idea.
"I know, Father. We could tickle the inside of the whale until he sneezes us out of his mouth." So they tickled,
and they tickled and they tickled until the whale [GULPS] - ACHOO! - sneezed,
and Geppetto and Pinocchio flew out of the whale's mouth at a hundred miles an hour and landed - THUMP!
- back on the shore. Pinocchio said to his father how sorry he was for lying, and for running away,
and by midnight they were both safely back, in the little house on the edge of town.
Geppetto kissed his son goodnight and they both had a nice long sleep.
And then in the morning, Pinocchio woke up and he felt very different. [GASPS]
And he raced into his father's room and said, "Look, Father! I'm a real boy at last." And indeed he was.
The end.