Hi, I'm Ella, and I'm from
I'm here with Lucas
and Tyler.
And we're part of Theater in the Open.
Theater in the Open is a performance group
that performs free plays in public spaces.
We have lots of props, costumes, and sets
in our performances.
(yelling)
TYLER: It's a foot!
This is Aisha.
She's the company manager and she has an assignment for us.
AISHA: Okay, guys, so as you know,
our new season is happening,
and we have a story with a dragon in it.
This is the dragon puppet.
Yes, it's very cool.
And the story that we're telling is about
why people think that dragons don't exist,
and why people are scared of dragons.
But we need him to be able to breathe fire in the story,
and right now he has this cool mouth
but, as you can see, what's missing from here,
where you can see my hand, we need fire to come out.
TYLER: So, obviously, not real fire,
because it would burn the wool.
We need fake flames, it's true.
We can't use real fire,
and it needs to be easy to turn on and off,
and it needs to be something that's repeatable.
You guys up for it?
KIDS: Yeah!
AISHA: All right, let's get started!
(laughing)
Okay, so here's some paper and some markers
so you can sketch out your idea
for your fire-breathing dragon plan.
Think we could have something that holds like streamers,
like, all the fire colors together,
and then we could have the streamers,
when somebody pushes it, it goes, puffs out.
TYLER: We could do almost like a glove with sticks attached,
to make it longer.
And kind of like have that, like when they stick their hand in,
they could just like move around to make it look like fire
and then they could just pull their hand back out,
and the glove would come back.
So, then you have your glove, and it would have streamers,
streamers, streamers...
TYLER: Yeah.
We decided to make a glove that we then attaches streamers to
so that you could control the fire.
ELLA: Okay, let's go look for some stuff.
We went into the workshop
to find a glove, some fabric for the flames,
and a dowel.
Red streamers...
LUCAS: We're gonna have to use socks instead of a glove
because we couldn't find any gloves.
TYLER: Snowball!
All right, guys, let's get building.
These are stilt pants.
(laughing) Lucas, they don't fit you.
Woo!
(laughing)
ELLA: We found a dowel
with some cheese attached to it.
I'm cutting up this dowel
to make smaller pieces so that then when the fire comes out
of the dragon's mouth, it won't just flop down.
It will actually stand straight up and it will
look like he's breathing it.
Okay, I think we're ready to show Aisha.
You would put your hand in there and then you breathe fire.
AISHA: Okay. So, I really like it.
I think it's really fun, and when you go like this,
it looks really fiery.
It's easy to wear; it's comfortable on my hand.
And it's kind of pretty.
I like that it's crepe paper
because it's really light, which is kind of fiery.
It can kind of flutter like fire does.
But I think one of the problems is that one of our parameters
was it had to be a repeatable thing,
like we had to be able to make it happen more than once,
and this one, it kind of only shoots out one time.
Instead of breathing fire, the dragon looked like
it was drooling fire.
AISHA: What comes to mind when you think about
something like shooting out of the dragon's mouth?
Like a birthday party, when you go like...
(mimics party horn)
When you go like...
Those blowy things kind of work like a spring.
How do you think we can get a party blower to work?
LUCAS: You know those foot rockets
where you stomp on it and then the air shoots the rocket up?
Maybe something where you could squeeze it
and then it goes like...
(mimics wind)
TYLER: Maybe we could use something in this room...
ELLA: Oh, this thing over here.
AISHA: That's a really good idea.
So, this is called a bellows,
and it sounds like it has the right idea of like
pushing air out.
Ella found a bellows next to the fireplace.
And we realized that was perfect if we connected it to a tube.
It's so refreshing...
We have this bellows thing, and so what else do we need?
Probably some party blowers and a tube of some sort.
Yeah, let's go see what we have.
LUCAS: Yeah! ELLA: Up and away!
LUCAS: We went back to the workshop and got some tubes,
party blowers, and balloons.
I think we have what we need. Let's go, come on!
So, we're going to have to tape the tube to the bellows
to make sure no air can get out.
(honking)
TYLER: I think we might need more than one blower
to make an actual fire.
Yeah, so, maybe we could put a bunch together.
We should probably stick to the colors of fire
so it would like blend in a little.
TYLER: So we can cut the balloon and make an airtight seal
around the blower.
ELLA: I'll hold this.
Open this like a...
Okay...
ELLA: The red one's caught. TYLER: There they go, I got it.
ELLA: We noticed some of the party blowers
weren't shooting out all the way
So we added some tape to make an airtight seal
so that the air from the bellows going into the party blowers
wouldn't leak out.
Now this would come around...
(cheering)
ALL: Aisha, come here!
AISHA (laughs): Hey, guys.
LUCAS: Hi!
We...
AISHA: Whoa, okay, show me how this works.
Can I see the dragon? ALL: Yes.
What we did is, when you blow through this, these go...
(mimics wind)
How do I get it involved with the dragon?
ELLA: What you do is you stick it through the thing here...
AISHA: Through the neck?
LUCAS: And then this part goes behind you.
AISHA: Okay, I think I got that part,
and then what do we do with the bellows?
LUCAS: It goes between your belt...
AISHA: Okay, ready?
Oh my gosh, you're being fired!
So, I love the design, but if we had more time,
I think it would've been cool to add something that looks
sort of like smoke.
LUCAS: Yeah, maybe like smoke through his nostrils.
So, I think these ideas are really amazing,
but you still did an awesome job.
ALL: Thanks, Aisha!
(laughing and cheering)
TYLER: After we showed Aisha our successful design,
Theater in the Open took the dragon and used it
at a performance at a local school.
...that I could breathe fire...
(giggling)