David Cooper

Citizen Crane | Puppeteer playwrights Dean Bareham and Jennie Esdale whoop it up in Project: Whooping Crane.

PROJECT: WHOOPING CRANE
Directed by Eileen Sproule. Created and performed by The Green Fools. TransAlta Arts Barns (10330-84 Ave). Nov 27-29, Dec 4-6 (Fridays @ 7pm, Saturdays and Sundays @ 2pm). Tickets available through the Fringe Theatre Adventures box office (409-1910/tickets.fringetheatre.ca)

The whooping crane is the largest bird in North America, but even though it’s five feet tall with an eight-foot wingspan, few of us will ever see one. There are fewer than 500 of them in the world, but that is a vast improvement from the 1940s, when the crane population dropped as low as 21 individual birds.

These rare birds captivated Jennie Esdale, co-artistic director of the Green Fools, a Calgary theatre company known for its work in puppetry, masks, and stiltwalkers. Esdale and the Fools’ other co-artistic director, Dean Bareham, started to research the biology and history of whooping cranes. “Jennie heard a story about a crane, a female, who was found with the corpse of her partner,” Bareham says. “Cranes mate for life.”

“It was sad and romantic,” adds Esdale.

“Through our research,” Bareham continues, “we found out about these people who brought the cranes back from extinction. It was a full-on, dedicated work of zookeepers and biologists.”

Edmonton audiences got a small taste of their efforts during the Street Performers Festival in 2004 when Esdale brought along one of the life-sized whooping crane puppets as a roving performer. But Project: Whooping Crane is a full-length theatrical production that uses puppets, masks, and music to tell the story of two cranes, each with different histories and destinies: one an injured female who is taken in by a zoo, like the one that originally caught Esdale’s attention; the other a chick born in captivity who grows up to be released into the wild.

“We found it was a very human story as well,” Esdale says. “‘Look at what we can do when we work together at something!’ The whooping crane story is a success story; people look to them as an example of conservation that works. The opposite is also true: human impact is responsible for their decline. Hunting, loss of habitat, power lines.”

We very nearly lost them. At one point, there were only 16 birds nesting at Wood Buffalo National Park, the cranes’ northern habitat. By the late ’60s, it was obvious that drastic measures were needed. “They had to take giant risks,” Esdale explains.“They had to be unorthodox. George Archibald, the famous scientist you see in films dancing with them, tried to stimulate breeding by wearing costumes and using puppets to feed the chicks. For us, it’s perfect! We are a puppet company, and that was what we had in common.”

Bareham and Esdale got permission to spend time studying captive whooping cranes at the Calgary Zoo, and consulted with scientists to get a greater understanding of their movement and behaviour. In a collaborative process with director Eileen Sproule and sound designer/composer Dave Clarke, they brought to life some of the things they saw. “Some of the things we discovered, like how they put the eggs in a sock to keep them warm, those details are fascinating,” Bareham says. “They are so committed. They will take a bird and spend 10 years with them to raise them to a reproductive age.”

The show itself is all sound and images; there is no dialogue. “It’s not just about the science,” Esdale says. “It’s also the telling of a narrative in alternative ways. It’s theatre that is operating at a high level of
innovation.”

Despite the lack of explanation, Esdale says audiences are moved by the story, sometimes to tears: “Adults tend to get quite emotional, and kids figure it out and enjoy watching them grow up.”

“I think art — especially theatre, and music — affects people more than they realize,” Bareham adds. “It’s almost subversive. We hear about the world in crisis in the news constantly, but with theatre, it connects people emotionally.”

Not only is Project: Whooping Crane successful physical theatre; it’s also won the approval of the zookeepers and scientists who know the whoopers the best — a career highlight for Bareham. “We were very honoured,” he says. “We did a command performance for the people at the International Crane Foundation. It was the most nervous I’ve ever been. Would they buy it? But they were beside themselves. We got a standing ovation. One of the guys said, ‘I felt like I was at work!’”

But in the end, Bareham says, the show is about more than the birds: “It’s symbolic of larger issues like love, commitment, understanding loss, and the pleasure of seeing something grow.”