Props and puppets: Raising the curtain on the creative team behind stage theatre

Cassie Seaboyer and Andrew Cull are pictured with a puppet plant at Neptune Theatre.

Work is truly practical magic for Cassie Seaboyer.

“You hear a moment [from the audience] like a gasp or an awe, and that’s the most successful moment for me. That’s when I know a puppet has been successful,” she said.

Seaboyer’s career is in puppet building. For the past eight years, the Halifax-based artist has created puppets for television and stage. Currently, she’s part of a team creating the four alien plants for Neptune Theatre’s upcoming production of ‘Little Shop of Horrors’.

“I think growing up I always had an interest in puppets and puppetry, but never quite fully understood what the world was,” she explains. “I grew up watching a lot of sci-fi movies and always enjoyed the practical effects that we see in it, like Jurassic Park, things like that. It wasn’t until I went to NSCAD University I was introduced to that world.”

Instead of drawing 3D characters, she wanted to create them. She was encouraged by her professor, Jeff Domm, to explore her interests in puppetry. That was followed by an apprenticeship in prosthetics with special effects makeup artist Marc Deveault in Nova Scotia’s Annapolis Valley. All skills that overlapped into her career as a puppet builder.

At Neptune, Seaboyer’s puppets have included Nana the dog from Peter Pan (2019-2020), the mice in Cinderella (2023-2024), and most recently, Olaf and Sven from Frozen (2024-2025). For film, she’s created puppets that range from armadillos to two-headed monsters.

“It really goes from either cute or gross,” she laughs. “Every puppet is different. When you’re making a new puppet, you’ve never made this puppet before. I love the challenge of it, but for me, it’s also discovering that puppet’s personality and character as you’re developing it – as it gets into a puppeteer hand. What do they do with the puppet? How do they breathe life into it? I love to see the process. Then, when it’s time to see it on stage with a live audience, I just love the moment when one of my puppets enters the stage and you can hear the audience react.”

Head of props

Andrew Cull has been the head of props at Neptune Theatre for over 20 years.

“I was very much a drama kid,” says Cull. “I liked the crowd, the environment, the vibe. People who are expressive and kind. I just kind of fell into this sort of work and environment.”

Cull studied technical theatre at York University in Toronto.

“When I tell strangers I work at Neptune Theatre, they’re instantly interested. They know it’s an institution. It’s important in the city. That’ll turn into a conversation about what they saw, or what they like, or even what they didn’t like. You get a real opinion of your work.”

Cull, who also specializes in set design, likes how every day is a different task, and with new productions comes news faces.

“One day you’re making 10,000 leaves, but then you don’t make 10,000 leaves again for 15 years. It changes all the time. Then the next show, you have to learn about 14th century paint finishes, or the care and handling of Indigenous props. It’s always interesting.”

Designing drama

For ‘Little Shop of Horrors,’ Neptune brought in set designer Rachel Forbes from Toronto, who also worked on ‘Controlled Damage.’

“I’ve never done a show with big puppets in it before,” says Forbes. “So, for me this is a first and it’s been wonderful. I do a lot of work that’s actually quite serious. I do [set design for] a lot of dramas, so this has been a very fun time to dive into a world of sci-fi and silliness. It’s great.”

‘Little Shop of Horrors’ is a Broadway musical that follows a florist shop worker and a carnivorous, talking alien plant that feeds on human blood. While researching for the show, Forbes had to study Venus flytraps and other carnivorous plants before bringing her ideas to the props team.

“So, all of that kind of feeds into how I came up with the aesthetic working with Jeremy [Webb, director] and then bringing those references and my ideas to the team for them to help me realize how can that happen, what can we do? What are the possibilities, what kinds of movements?” said Forbes. “A lot of times I came up with an idea and then they would build on that, you know, make something, make it better even.”

In the end, the creative team had to build four different puppet plants for ‘Little Shop of Horrors.’ Two can be hand-held, while one needs a person inside it to operate the puppet.

“It’s a lot of work, and I would say that the process of design and build is quote symbiotic. To design something, I need the expertise of all these wonderful people [puppet builders] to understand how it goes together, how it operates. I’m not the puppet expert, I’m just the aesthetic person. The initial work was coming up with ideas, doing lots of research.”

Picking up props

Those in the industry share the same advice on entering the art of props.

“Just got for it,” says Seaboyer. “There are so many great resources online. I’ve learned so much just from finding videos on YouTube from other puppet builders. Don’t be afraid to make mistakes. For every puppet I’ve made, there’s always been a mock-up version. A failed version. But without that failed version, I never would’ve gotten to the final. It’s just to important to research and prototype your puppets, and then you’ll eventually get to that finished product.”

Andrew Cull agrees.

“Just do it,” Cull adds. “Do it and take pictures. Then show up at the ambitious place you could go next. Like, if you’ve been doing a lot of community theatre, come here [to Neptune] and say, ‘these are my pictures, this is my portfolio.’ A place like us [Neptune] can see their talent. We could bring them up to the next level. Just keep doing it and keep taking pictures.”

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