FAMILY : Creatures Give Comfort in Puppet Play ‘Dream Catchers’

Riding on a sea horse, flying like a bird, talking with trees, meeting monsters and vampires--such stuff of dreams can be found in the California premiere of Theatre Sans Fil’s children’s puppet play “The Dream Catchers,” playing Saturday and Sunday at Cerritos Center for the Performing Arts.

Fiberglass, latex and fabric--for Theatre Sans Fil, that’s a recipe for magic. Two years in the making, this fantasy based on real kids’ dreams and nightmares is filled with the award-winning, 25-year-old Montreal company’s trademark giant puppet creations, from life-size children to an 11-foot-tall talking Candy Tree.

“The show gave us the chance to create all these different creatures from the imagination of kids,” said Andre Viens, the company’s artistic director. “Whether it’s a monster under a bed or a crocodile, or a big talking tree, everything is related to (universal) fears and desires and goals.”

In the play by Henriette Major, two children, Jeffrey and Melissa, share their dreams, enjoying good times and helping each other when things get scary. In an “endless forest,” Melissa is confronted by a vampire, a bandit and a wolf. Jeffrey fights a crocodile and rides underwater on a sea horse. In a flying fantasy, the pair are joyfully reunited with their little dog who had died sometime before.

“Dreams are a way we confront ourselves,” Viens said. “ ‘Dream Catchers’ is about kids’ realities. We’re trying to show them different paths they can take to resolve bad dreams, and to encourage them to talk about their dreams with parents and teachers and friends.”

“The most surprising thing to me when I first saw this show,” said Serge Deslauriers, one of the five puppeteers who between them operate more than 25 puppets in the play, “was how similar it was to my dreams when I was young. I love the monster. He’s very frightening at first, but when Jefferey talks to him, the children realize he doesn’t know why he scares children--it’s just his job.”

Viens, a science-fiction movie fan, incorporates film-style special effects into the show, including onstage pyrotechnics, special lighting and black-light sequences. The prerecorded soundtracks for all the shows are performed by professional actors, allowing the company to tour internationally in several languages.

The puppetry itself is not child’s play. Technical and physical challenges include the unusual height and weight of the puppets--the largest and heaviest puppet in “Dream Catchers” is an 11-foot-tall, 7-foot-wide, 40-pound Candy Tree, which Deslauriers supports on his shoulders. “It keeps you very much in shape,” he noted.

To complicate matters, the black-clad puppeteers, who stand behind the puppets Japanese bunraku-style, sometimes two, three or more to a puppet, are generally operating blind.

“Most of the time you can’t see if the other puppet looks at you, or you don’t see the face of your own puppet because you are behind it, so it’s based on trust between the puppeteers. You really have to be coordinated perfectly together,” Deslauriers said.

To assuage any lingering concerns about the show’s scarier sequences with witches, vampires and other monster-types, the puppeteers demystify them with a post-show demonstration that reveals how the puppets work. “It’s great to be scared,” Viens said, “but not too much.”

* “The Dream Catchers,” Cerritos Center for the Performing Arts, 12700 Center Court Drive, Saturday, 7 p.m.; Sunday, 2 p.m. $16-$25; (310) 916-8500.