Stir Q&A: With The Storyville Mosquito, Kid Koala takes multitasking to creative new heights in live "cinema experience"
Taking his place at the piano and turntable, the artist stages a one-of-a-kind family show with 20 miniature sets, 75 puppets, eight cameras, and a string trio
The Storyville Mosquito tells the tale of a young insect who leaves home for big-city dreams of becoming a musician.
The Storyville Mosquito is at the Massey Theatre on November 25 at 7:30 pm and November 26 at 2 pm
AS HIS LEGIONS OF FANS KNOW, beloved Vancouver-raised DJ and turntablist Kid Koala has always played across artforms. His 2003 album Nufonia Must Fall was accompanied by a comic book, after all. And his latest vinyl record, Creatures of the Late Afternoon, has a jacket that folds out into a pretty damn fun board game. Elsewhere, he’s coproduced and composed music for the breakdance video game Floor Kids and created books like space cadet, a 132-page etchboard graphic novel about an astrophysicist/space explorer. You know, when he’s not busy at the turntables opening for the likes of Björk and Gorillaz.
But with The Storyville Mosquito, finally hitting the Massey Theatre, the maestro of multitasking wields many more art forms than usual—from scratching to visual art, cinema, and live theatre. The production literally gets created, by hand, in front of audiences’ eyes, complete with miniature sets, puppetry, cinematography, and live music by Kid Koala and a string trio. In other words, everything gets performed, filmed, projected, and scored in real time in an experience that falls somewhere between Chaplin silent movie, concert, and classic stop-motion.
In a family-friendly tale that is a must-see for “cool parents” and their kids, a young mosquito leaves his little town in the country with the dream of playing in one of the greatest bands of all time in the big city.
Stir spoke to the ever-energized Kid about the origins of the wee insect, the logistical craziness of staging the show, and his love of handmadeness.
We understand this show demands a small army of puppeteers, musicians, and others to pull off. Can you give us a sense of the logistics of orchestrating all this live?
Essentially we are telling this story as a “one-take” film on stage at each performance. There is a team of 15 of us working together to create the live puppetry, lighting, cinematography, music and foley. We know the scenes, we know the acting beats, the camera moves, music tempos and lifts, but we all have to work together to synchronize and to make it work. It's like an orchestra... But a multimedia one. It also helps that everyone can multitask a little bit. For instance in some scenes, one of the puppeteers may be operating one of the mosquito's arms, but in the next moment in the show, they might have to create a moving light special effect, or prepare a set for the next scene so we can seamlessly cut to it. Even the musicians have different jobs depending on the scene. Sometimes it’s playing some more classical score music, other times it’s adding foley or cartoony sound effects to sting certain comedic moments.
Kid Koala.
We’ve heard this described as a “theatrical cinema experience”, but what’s it really like watching this story come to life?
It’s a whole lot of fun! The Storyville Mosquito is like a live, modern twist on the silent-film-era experience. I remember being introduced to Charlie Chaplin's films as a child. And it was the first time I can remember all three generations of my family sitting together and enjoying the same movie. It was so special to be with my parents and grandmother laughing, crying, and being swept up into the story together. Even at that moment, I knew when I grew up I wanted to do something to create that type of feeling or connectivity between people.
On stage, we’ve set up the stage with 20 miniature sets, 75 puppets, eight cameras, an area for a string trio, and me on piano and turntable. Above the stage there is a large projection screen. You can watch the screen like you would watch a movie, but at any moment you can glance down at the stage and see all the puppeteers and cinematographers create those scenes. In essence, you get to see the film and the making-of simultaneously. Nothing is pre-recorded and everything is done right before your eyes—even the visual special effects and camera moves have to be performed!
Where were the beginnings of the Mosquito character? We heard you first started drawing the little guy 20 years ago?
Actually, I’ve been drawing bugs since I was a very young child. Perhaps it was because my family didn’t have a pet dog in the house. So as a young child, the insects in the yard were the things I would see that were actually alive. Who knows? Maybe in another life I could have studied entomology! As a child I would draw tougher insects like warrior beetles and scorpions, but in my 20s I wanted to see if I could make an empathetic story about a mosquito. I was working on a new turntable scratch technique at the time and one of my friends who was visiting the studio said, “Hey that sounds like a mosquito!” That’s when it all clicked. Those early audio and visual sketches evolved into the character that is now in the show. Putting a production together like this can take several years. But I’m gad we’re finally on the road and it’s great to see the audiences enjoying themselves at the show!
Why “create it live” and handmade in a world that leans toward prefab and overprocessed things—and we assume that ties into your love of turntablism too?
This production is all about the live performance and human energy. I love that it’s all done by hand in real time, that way it really becomes alive. From the puppetry, to the hand-painted sets, to the hand-operated camera moves, to the hand-scratched sound effects. It’s the combination of all of those things that make this such a special show for me. All of the tiny decisions that everyone on the team makes to make each scene funnier, more poignant, more suspenseful, more cinematic. On the one hand it’s a very technical show to pull off, but on the other hand the story we’re telling on the screen is a charming love story about following your dreams.
I’ll be on piano, turntables, and various percussion gadgets to help push the story along sonically since there is no dialogue in the film.
As my friend and mentor K.K. Barrett and director of our previous production Nufonia Must Fall would say, “You have to come to the theatre to experience it, after that it evaporates until its next performance.” There are no pre-recorded visuals in this show, everything is captured on stage and because of that there’s definitely a “danger” factor that it can all fall apart at any moment. From a performance perspective, it’s a lot of fun for all of us to be working together synchronously to create each scene.
With all you have going on, what do you use as your job description these days?
Multimedia-multitasker and dad. Haha. These productions are a place where I feel many of my favourite things collide. My love of film, theatre, visual art, music, and live performance. The loop closes when we've been on tour and hearing the audiences laugh—and cry—and enjoying themselves. It's all in the name of fun and creativity. To make something with your friends and share it with audiences is such a dream job. I feel very lucky to be working with such a talented group of performers and I'm very much looking forward to bringing this show to Massey Theatre. It will be the first time we'll bring this production to the Pacific Northwest. I hope people will bring their friends and families. This will be fun!
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