BUDULÍNEK (Fairy tale about listening and hearing)

Vít Peřina

Genre: puppet fairy tale for children from the age of 4
Cast: variable (2-5 actors with puppets, optimal cast: 1 actor and 1 actress)

Budulínek does not listen to what his grandparents say, grandpa and grandma do not hear well and the fox hears too much...

This text respects the well-known story of a classic Czech fairy tale about a disobedient boy but expands on several innovative motives. The topic of listening concerns not only the disobedient Budulínek or oversensitive ears of the sneaky fox but also Budulínek’s grandparents who on the contrary cannot hear almost anything. Both of them love to play musical instruments. And these are no ordinary instruments – grandpa has got himself drums and grandma an electronic violin. It’s no surprise that they frequently need go for check-ups to the ear doctor because of playing too loud music. The sneaky fox takes advantage of their frequent absence and kidnaps little Budulínek to her burrow. She hopes that Budulínek will entertain her unruly offspring whose screaming makes her ears hurt. Rescue expedition of those two hard of hearing rockers brings an unexpected denouement and surprising point. Children can also learn a lesson from the story as in all good fairy tales.

The play was for the first time produced at the Naïve Theatre in Liberec and it has received several awards, including the Erik prize for the most inspiring puppet production of the year. The play also received the Theatre Newspaper Award for the play of the season 2011/2012 in the category of Alternative Theatre and the award of the Mateřinka festival in 2013.

The play is available in the Czech original and Slovak translation.