The annual performance of Sandglass Theater’s signature work is more than a tradition. Autumn Portraits captures the very spirit of this bittersweet season with a series of poignant cameos portraying moments in the “autumn” of life. Eric Bass has been performing his one-man, many-puppet show for over three decades. The interwoven vignettes produce striking images as the puppeteer’s oh-so-animate objects reflect on the past, the uncertain present and the all-too-certain future. Bass performs in full view, becoming a partner of both the puppet and the spectator. The scenes are mysterious, then melancholy, then laugh-out-loud comical.
The puppets, most of them about a foot high, are suffused with lively detail, as are the stories themselves. They evoke particular cultures and epochs, but are elusively timeless. There’s a mythic tale with echoes of Native American tradition; a witty portrait of an old Jewish cobbler haggling with the angel of death; a parable of a mystic invoking his inner self, only to violently repudiate it; and at the end, an unabashedly vaudevillian turn complete with holiday singalong.
Nov. 29, 7:30 p.m., $13-$16. Limited seating; reservations recommended. Sandglass Theater, 17 Kimball Hill, Putney, Vt., sandglasstheater.org, (802) 387-4051.
