Interview: Puppeteer Sam Jay Gold of ALL VOWS at Morris Museum's Bickford Theatre

"All Vows" is a puppet memory play by puppeteer, theatre artist, and writer, Sam Jay Gold, where history and imagination collide in a heartwarming tale. The play is centered on the possibly true life of his grandfather, Poppy, a Russian Jewish refugee raised in China. Poppy is portrayed through five hand-carved, wooden puppets, each modeled after him at a different age in his life. It will be performed at Morris Museum's Bickford Theatre from May 6th to May 8th.

Broadwayworld had the pleasure of interviewing Sam about his career and the upcoming show at Morris Museum's Bickford Theatre.

With the support of a Thomas J. Watson Fellowship, Sam studied traditional forms of puppetry around the world. He trained in marionettes in the Czech Republic, Noh and Bunraku in Japan, and Wayang Kulit in Bali, while exploring empathy, imagination, and projection across the animate/inanimate divide. These experiences cemented Sam's belief in the primal power of the puppet, of the shadow, of the not-quite-lifelike, as vessels for surprising, delighting, and challenging audiences with transformative storytelling.

Sam's original work has been supported by the Jim Henson Foundation and featured at venues including St. Ann's Warehouse, BAM, and the New York State Puppetry Festival. He is co-founder of The Brothers Campur, a Balinese-American shadow puppet company performing classic and contemporary Wayang Kulit throughout the US and Indonesia. Sam is also a longtime collaborator with Roman Paska, assisting in the development of and performing in works including Fall Of The House of Usher (Mass MoCA) and Echo In Camera (Watermill Center, La MaMa, Palais de Tokyo, DIALOG Festival).

Sam has performed in shows at Lincoln Center, HERE Arts, The Merry-Go-Round Theater, The Eugene O'Neill Theater, La MaMa, Dixon Place, and The NYC Highline, as well as toured works in France, Poland, and Indonesia. His writings on theater and puppetry have been featured in Bauhaus Magazine, Puppetry International, and Mime Journal.

When not performing, writing, or making new shows, Sam assists in puppet fabrication at AchesonWalsh Studios and works as a teaching artist at The New Victory Theater, Lincoln Center Theater, The Kennedy Center, and CO/LAB Theater Group, where he offers individuals with developmental disabilities a creative and social outlet through puppetry and other theater arts. Sam is a member of SAG-AFTRA and a graduate of Pomona College.

What was your earliest interest in puppetry?

Like a lot of kids, I grew up on Sesame Street and The Muppets, but I didn't find a deeper interest in puppetry until I studied theater at Pomona College, where I was exposed to a lineage of theater practitioners who approached acting as the art of becoming a vessel for audiences to project their feelings upon - as opposed to the art of becoming a character who projected their own feelings out onto an audience. I was struck by how many of these artists held up the puppet as an aspirational goal for a human performer, which sparked my interest in exploring puppetry, itself.

At this same time, I had gotten into a huge fight with a dear friend, during which he'd accused me of lacking empathy. I was shaken by the thought - in large part because I worried it might be true - which threw me into a bit of an existential crisis and sparked a desire to better understand just how empathy worked. How do people relate to one another? I felt overwhelmed by the question, but exploring how people related to inanimate objects - things they know aren't alive but somehow still invest in - felt more approachable. And so puppetry became this entry point for a now-career long exploration into how we find meaning and connection with the world around us.

Can you tell us a little about your education in the arts?

I caught the acting bug in middle school, and my theater education greatly expanding in college, but my puppetry training really got going in my first year after undergrad, when I was awarded a Thomas J. Watson Fellowship, which supported me for one year of international travel as I studied traditional forms of puppetry around the world. I trained in wood-carving and Marionettes in the Czech Republic, Bunraku in Japan, and Wayang Kulit (shadow puppetry) in Indonesia. It was during this year that puppetry became more than an idea for me. Working with raw materials, creating new work, relying on gesture and shape as I performed in languages I hardly understood... That was how I began to discover the primal power of the shadow, the inanimate material, the not-quite-lifelike, as vessels for surprising, delighting, and challenging audiences through transformative storytelling. I've been working with puppets ever since.

Have you had any particular mentors?

My high school theater teacher, Courtney Flanagan, was my first mentor. She taught me how to process and engage with my inner world of experiences and emotions - and then how to honestly express them in front of other people. She also taught me that passion is important, but never a replacement for hard work. My faculty advisor in college, the ground-breaking Corporeal Mime, Thomas Leabhart, taught me how to stand still in my own body, how to chase after inspiration, and how to make my own work. And I owe so much of my puppetry chops to my ongoing relationship with Roman Paska, a brilliant puppet artist, director, and teacher, who took a chance on me a decade ago and turned my clumsy hands into passably dextrous instruments.

Tell us about the challenges of creating your shows?

My work typically begins with an extensive devising process - ideas, images, physical gestures, and entire puppet movement sequences often come before any words are scripted, which can be challenging! I liken it to climbing a mountain without a map: There are false starts, branching paths, unexpected detours. In the earliest version of All Vows, for example, I never spoke, instead asking other actors to perform monologues I'd written about my own family while I mostly worked with the puppets. I wasn't ready to insert myself into the show, even though it was clearly about me, as much as it was about my grandfather. Over time, that dynamic changed - now, as we gear up for the show's premiere, I'm the only person onstage who speaks, while two other performers - the oh-so-talented Ali Goss and Liz Oakley - spend far more time puppeteering than I. That's another way devising is like climbing a mountain: you've got to have a great team if you ever hope to reach the top. Ali and Liz have worked with me on this show for nearly a year now, always ready to offer new ideas or critiques to the development process. They - alongside Chris Carcione (our Projection/Live Feed Designer), Ian Coss (our Sound Designer) and Avery Bargar (our Artistic Consultant) - have been invaluable to the process.

You have had such an impressive performance career. Can you tell us about a particular show that stands out in your memory?

That's very kind of you to say! I've been lucky enough to perform shows at bucket-list venues like BAM and St. Ann's Warehouse, but one show I'll never forget was my very first performance of a wayang kulit (shadow puppetry) play, which was held in the driveway of my Balinese teacher's house, on a quiet street in Denpasar. I was so nervous. Wayang Kulit is a one-person show, wherein the dalang (shadow puppeteer) performs with as many as 40 different puppet characters in front of an open flame - all without a script, improvising their way through a re-telling of a sprawling story, often a excerpt from a Hindu epics like the Mahabharata or the Ramayana. The Dalang is expected to sing, to throw their voice, and to speak in multiple languages - all of which I'd practiced for quite some time, but I was still an absolute newbie. I was so humbled by the talent of my local friends and teachers, as well as their willingness to welcome me into a centuries-old performance tradition far outside my own upbringing. By the end of the show, my voice was hoarse and my lap was singed with embers from the fire, but the rush of joy and awe I felt as the final notes of the gamelan played is something I hold very close to my heart to this day.

What was your inspiration for "All Vows?"

"All Vows" is about the possibly true life of my grandfather, a Russian-born Jewish refugee who grew up in China, studied medicine in Italy, became a surgeon in Shanghai during WWII, then started all over in America. I have always felt very close to my grandfather, but I was only four when he died - and lately I've been grappling with how I'm guilty of transforming the best parts of his life story into a sort of "origin mythology" for my own identity and pursuits. "All Vows" attempts to rectify this mythologizing, presenting a character study of my grandfather - the man - while also reckoning with large questions of legacy and inheritance, how a family history can shape its descendants just as its descendants can uphold or reshape their own history. The show features five hand-carved wooden puppets, each modeled after my grandfather at a different age of his life, as well as audio from conversations with my dad, and the only video footage recorded of my grandfather before he died - each presenting conflicting and complementary stories from my grandfather's life as I stage an attempt to relive stories, question memories, and piece together just who Ralph Peter Gold really was.

What would you like Bickford Theatre audiences to know about the show?

That my Mom designed and fabricated all the puppet costumes featured in the show! I don't know if I've ever heard my Mom call herself an artist, but she was absolutely the first person to teach me how to be creative, wherever your inspiration takes you. It was an amazing experience collaborating with her on the puppet costumes. You won't believe the amount of detail she added to an 18" tall, three-piece suit!

For the future?

"All Vows" was conceived with touring and festivals in mind. We're already in talks with a few venues about future runs - hopefully we'll have more dates on the books soon! In the meantime a play I wrote in 2017 is set to premiere as a six-part narrative podcast with original music on PRX early next month. The podcast was co-created with my longtime friend and collaborator, Ian Coss (creator of "Forever is a Long Time," a 2021 NYTimes Podcast of the Year). We've got an incredible cast, including some fantastic Broadway performers. I can't say anything more about it for now, but I'm so excited to share more in just a few weeks!

Anything else, absolutely anything you want BWW readers to know.

Arts education is life preparation! If you can play an active role in a young person's ability to access art and art-making opportunities - especially from and for under-represented voices and communities - please do so!

For more information on Sam, visit his website www.samjaygold.com and follow him on

Twitter @SamJayGold.

"All Vows" will be performed at Morris Museum's Bickford Theatre on Friday, May 6, 8:00pm; Saturday, May 7, 8:00pm; and Sunday, May 8, 2:00pm. For tickets and more information, please visit https://morrismuseum.org/theatre-information/.

Photo Credit: Michael Svoboda.

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