Puppet show Epidermis Circus gets weird at Surrey Arts Centre on October 2
In the SNAFU Society of Unexpected Spectacles production, Fraggle Rock puppeteer Ingrid Hansen brings a little stinker named Baby Tyler to adorably sassy life
Ingrid Hansen performing Epidermis Circus. Photo by Helene Cyr
SNAFU Society of Unexpected Spectacles presents Epidermis Circus at the Surrey Arts Centre on October 2 at 7:30 pm
IT’S BILLED AS “the weirdest puppet show you’ve ever seen”, and it’s hard to argue with that. In fact, Victoria’s SNAFU Society of Unexpected Spectacles would almost certainly be correct if it were to promise that Epidermis Circus is “the weirdest puppet show you ever will see”.
One reviewer summed it up like this: “Imagine Shari Lewis possessed by David Lynch.” Actually, though, Jim Henson might be a better comparison than Lewis, since Epidermis Circus co-creator and puppeteer Ingrid Hansen has actually worked on The Jim Henson Company’s Fraggle Rock: Back to the Rock series, among other kid-friendly TV shows.
Baby Tyler. Photo by Helene Cyr
Unlike Fraggle Rock, though, Epidermis Circus isn’t for children. SNAFU recommends the show for ages 14 and up, and for good reason. Things do tend to get a bit spicy.
“It’s a celebration of bodies—all the wonderful things about our bodies and all the disgusting things about our bodies,” Hansen told Stir in a 2021 interview. “With body puppetry, you can animate anything—your hands, your feet, your shoulder, your face… You can animate creatures and characters out of any of your body parts.”
The undisputed fan favourite character in Epidermis Circus is Baby Tyler, essentially just a baby doll’s head plunked on Hansen’s hand and blown up on a big projection screen.
“No matter how it’s looking at you, you feel like he’s a little stinker, like he’s going to kind of be up to no good, but so cute too,” Epidermis Circus director and cocreator Britt Small told Stir in an interview last year. “There was just something about him. I just immediately fell in love with him. And Ingrid got so good at puppeteering him—just all the details that she does with her fingers and her hands. It’s quite wild, and I found myself mesmerized in rehearsals. I was like, ‘I could watch this for hours!’”
With an all-star creative team that also includes composer Hank Pine and costume designer James Insell—better known to Canada’s Drag Race fans as Jimbo the Drag Clown—expect Epidermis Circus to be a wild ride. And a very, very weird one. 
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