The Iranian shows at 2023 International Puppet Festival had a lot to say

The 19th Tehran-Mubarak Puppet Show Festival was held in Tehran from June 29 to July 9 with the competition of puppet shows from all over the world.  Hassan Dadshekar, a pioneer of puppet shows, was honored in the closing ceremony of the festival.

Dadshekar is one of the veteran puppet theater artist and one of the most memorable artists who has a special place among several generations of teenagers and children of Iran due to his works.

About the state of puppetry education in Iran, he said: I think the state of academic education of puppet theater art in Iran is pathetic. One of the reasons is that there is no thought for the working conditions of the students who train and become educated.

This veteran artist further explained: In many countries, theater centers hire students, and so the student works in the same center after graduation. If we had worked in the same way as the center for the intellectual development of children and teenagers in the sixties, so that the child or teenager could discover their talents and weaknesses of their society and be able to criticize and give opinions about it and ultimately become social, then we had done the right thing

This actor and theater director also emphasized on the education of the theater audience and said: When we focus on the box office, we write story that is only liked by the audience. Such a show makes the audience shallow. Producing entertaining shows is not bad, rather, it is a need, but the problem is that we have not trained the audience for our future to know all types of shows and choose the show they like.

He evaluated the current Iranian puppet shows: We are well established in the production of puppets . But in addition to updating the dolls and their movement and guidance tools, we must also update the necessary content. We must not forget that the basis of the puppet show is imagination, because a puppet moves in front of the viewer's eyes and takes him to the world of childhood. Our most important weakness in puppet  theater is that we lack skilled and capable writers.

Hassan Dadshekar also commented on the quality of the works presented at the 19th Tehran-Mubarak Puppet Show Festival: Watching Iranian shows, I realized that they have a lot to say, although they have not done the work as they should. But the shows became better.