Press ESC or click the X to close this window

Jina and the Stem Sisters (Susan Elkin reviews)

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/

Author information
Susan Elkin Susan Elkin is an education journalist, author and former secondary teacher of English. She was Education and Training Editor at The Stage from 2005 - 2016
More posts by Susan Elkin