The Herds: 'Being a puppeteer in a parade is really difficult'

BBC News

03-07-2025

Operating life-sized puppets "is really difficult", a student who is responsible for the theatrical movements of a giant giraffe in The Herds parade has said.Joel Munesu Mutamiri, 21, will help operate the model during a parade of wooden safari animal puppets in Manchester city centre later.The student from the Manchester School of Theatre admitted it was "quite hard"."I started off on the gorilla and it was a struggle because the model was so low to the ground," he added. "The giraffe is like carrying something on your shoulders, which I find a lot easier".
The Herds, which is travelling from Africa to the Artic Circle in a bid to highlight climate change, will move to Heywood near Rochdale on Friday and Pennington Flash in Leigh on Saturday.
'Wow moment'
In each location a new team of volunteers step up to operate the puppets. One of them, Jude Battersby, 60, from Sale, helped to make some of the models and will be helping to operate a deer during the parade."Each animal has got levers so each joint can move and they're all made so they can move down - as if they're grazing - or upwards so they can be alert," she said."The wow moment was when the heads were put on - they just came alive."
'It'll be chaos'
The puppets are made from upscaled and recyclable materials – primarily cardboard and plywood – with a focus on biodegradable and organic materials.Eva Greeves from Winton in Salford has been helping to make some of the puppets for The Herds. The 27 year-old said she would also be helping to operate a red deer. "You start thinking about how the animal would behave, how would it be unpredictable and how would it engage with its environment"."Its going to be chaos - is really just going to take the city by storm".
The Herds tour began on 9 April in the Democratic Republic of Congo and then travelled north, through locations in Africa and western Europe.The puppets have visited cities including Lagos in Nigeria, Dakar in Senegal, Marrakesh in Morocco and Marseille in France. After The Herds has visited Greater Manchester, the parade will move to Copenhagen in Denmark, Stockholm in Sweden and Trondheim in Norway.
The Herds parade marks the start of Manchester International Festival, which first took place in 2007. The Herds has been put together by The Walk Productions, which in 2019 created the journey of Little Amal, a 12ft high puppet of a Syrian refugee child.