The Puppets Up! International Puppet Festival, a popular family-focused 3-day annual festival, celebrated the art of puppetry.
It brought exciting international puppet troupes from all over the world to downtown Almonte.
Through its colourful mix of ticketed puppet shows in tents and theatres, its free street entertainment and parades, its adult cabaret and puppet vendors and puppet workshops, Puppets Up! brought crowds and renown to Almonte and Mississippi Mills and helped to brand our community as a place to be.
After 12 glorious years, on August 7th, 2016, at the top of its game, Puppets Up! International Puppet Festival decided to call it quits.
Many reasons contributed to this decision, but the festival’s difficult combination of increasing size along with diminishing funds was top of the list. The festival’s Board of Directors reluctantly decided that it was better to be prudent fiscally rather than to carry on recklessly and risk possible personal financial liability.
A new format and a new name for Puppets Up! International Puppet Festival was established: “Puppets Up! Presents”. Now, instead of presenting one 3-day festival per year, our organization will produce or sponsor smaller events throughout the year under the “Puppets Up! Presents” name.
During 2017, “Puppets Up Presents” took part in many community activities — an Almonte General Hospital whiskey tasting evening, a week-long puppet workshop at the Ottawa Children’s Festival, Canada Day events in Almonte and Pakenham, plus puppet shows in Perth, Kemptville and Clayton.
And … coming soon to the Ron Caron Auditorium at the Almonte Old Town Hall … a puppet adaptation of “It’s a Wonderful (Mississippi Mills) Life” December 15, 16 & 17 in time for Christmas. This follows last year’s successful puppet adaptation of “A (Mississippi Mills) Christmas Carol”.
Any funds earned by “Puppets Up! Presents” will go towards maintaining our new presentation efforts and keeping our organization financially viable. We will endeavour to keep our charitable status by ensuring that an educational component is always included in our schedule.
The puppets of Almonte will continue to add to the spice of life in our community!
