Under-appreciated and Underwater, Plus Muppets
The 1981 movie The Great Muppet Caper has a clipped dubbed “Miss Piggy’s Fantasy” in which she takes part in some synchronized swimming (also known as artistic swimming – because solo events don’t really need you to be “synchronized” with anyone else, but then you synchronize with the music… I digress).
A somewhat random thing to watch on a Saturday morning while having breakfast, but here it is:
Anyway, my attention was first drawn to the swimmers – what they were doing required them to be athletic and graceful at the same time… the same is expected from dancers on land, but artistic swimmers need to have the added cardiopulmonary capacity to control their breathing (more than just holding their collective breaths) for extended periods of time. With team events, the individual swimmer has to be attuned to the movements of the rest of the group, adding another layer of complexity to the routine. I don’t think I’ve ever watched an artistic swimming competition or event live. I may have seen some in a Cirque du Soleil show but with all the other stuff going on, it was easy to miss the swimming.
Why don’t we hear or read more about these athletes in the mainstream media? That’s why I think they’re under-appreciated. It’s not a popular sport, unlike basketball, football or hockey. Perhaps gymnastics and diving are its closest relatives among sports, but we hear more about them than artistic swimming. Another reason is they straddle the artistic and the athletic, and our world has this false dichotomy between the two, while actually they are not mutually exclusive.
Puppeteering (and muppeteering, if you want to call it that with this special case), is an art form unto itself with its own challenges. In addition to being an actor, the puppeteer also has to be well in-tune with fine motor (fingers, hands) and gross motor coordination (big movements from arms, legs and trunk), because that’s how he gives life to the puppet. Add to that the required endurance so he does not fatigue easily while in awkward body positions (most evident in full-body puppets like Big Bird or the animals from The Lion King musical). Then, if you put the puppet (in this case, muppet) in the water where he is challenged with additional cardiopulmonary conditions – that’s a whole ‘nother ballgame.
That’s my Performing Arts Medicine breakdown of this 3-minute clip. Would love to hear your thoughts.
