ina and the STEM Sisters from HMDT Music, streaming until 11 April 2021.
Star rating: four stars ★ ★ ★ ★ ✩
If a puppetry mini-opera about women scientists sounds unlikely, then it is. But it works. I learned a lot, as will the primary school age group at which Jina and the STEM Sisters is, loosely, aimed.
It’s neatly contrived for pandemic restrictions too. Basically it’s a two-hander with puppeteers (Nix Wood and Ruth Calkin) on stage and a lot of puppet voicing, both sung and spoken, by a cast who are elsewhere.
Face masks – bandit style and matching – are, incidentally a good way of depersonalising puppeteers to make them less visible.
Jina, who wants to be a scientist, is in a wood. It’s literal with trees but it’s also metaphorical because she’s on a journey towards enlightenment …
Read the rest of this review at Musical Theatre Review: https://musicaltheatrereview.com/jina-and-the-stem-sisters-hmdt-music/
