Spare Parts Puppet Theatre presents July season of Hare Brain at Ellie Eaton Theatre, Claremont Showground

There is no denying the sentimentality Spare Parts Puppet Theatre artistic director Philip Mitchell feels towards high-energy puppetry comedy Hare Brain.

A modern twist on Aesop’s classic fable The Tortoise And The Hare, it was the first work he created after joining the Fremantle-based company in 2002 from Terrapin Puppet Theatre in Tasmania.

“At the time, I had quite a passion for object theatre, where objects could tell stories,” Mitchell shares.

“I suppose we sort of took that premise of hare thinking and tortoise thinking, and me being very much a hare thinker, stepped into this new job as artistic director going ‘Oh my God, there’s so much to do. I’m so excited. Oh, wow.’ I was pretty much inspired by my own excitement.”

Written by Justin Cheek, who also penned the puppet theatre company’s adaptation of Tim Winton’s The Deep, Hare Brain asks the pivotal question of whether slow and steady really does win the race, taking inspiration from the well-known fable and posing it in a contemporary context.

The production is a toy story with a competitive edge, set in a wacky, high-stakes world where quick-thinking marketing executive Harry and creative methodical cleaner Toulouse are in a race to create the next big toy invention.

“Toulouse, who’s the cleaner in the office, is the tortoise thinker, and he tells the story through objects, so a plastic bag becomes a hare, the mop bucket becomes the tortoise, and the spectators are mops and brooms,” Mitchell says.

“He tells it in a transformational imagined way, whereas Harry wants to use big fluffy bunnies to tell his story. He wants to use soft toys that are easy to understand and very quick and fast.”

While the seduction of technology was really taking off at the time of Hare Brain’s creation in 2002 — especially with mobile phones and a relatively new internet — Mitchell has been forced to make some technology tweaks to the production ahead of its July school holiday season at Claremont Showground’s Ellie Eaton Theatre.

“It has just been such a joy to watch the show mature into a work for 2024,” Mitchell says.

“We used to have a fax machine in it and even performer Oliver Hughes, who’s just graduating from WAAPA, didn’t know what a fax machine was, so we had to get rid of it. The mobile phones that we were using were all bricks or flip phones, so we’ve needed some fake iPhones. It’s been lovely reflecting on the way technology has changed so quickly, and what young people understand. Even finding the archival video of the production to watch meant transferring it to a DVD, but can you find a computer that plays a DVD? I had to fish out my old Mac.

“I’ve been catching the train to Claremont, and I just sit in the train thinking ‘wow, everybody’s on their mobile phone’. There’s no looking out at the scenery going past, there’s no boredom. There’s no just sitting and being and taking tortoise time. We’re constantly sort of stimulating our brains with great things.”

Without getting too didactic about the show’s messages about screen time, Mitchell believes, like everything, it is all about the importance of balance and hopes Hare Brain will spark those conversations.

The season is also set to inspire its young audiences with pre-show and post-show activities, including fostering the unleashing of their inner inventor with broken toys generously donated by Fremantle op shops — think next door neighbour Sid’s creations in film Toy Story.

“So things like Barbie doll legs with rubber fish heads and mega blocks . . . inventing their own toys, and using their imaginations and warped senses of humour,” Mitchell laughs.

“Toy Story is one of my favourite movies.”

Hare Brain is at Ellie Eaton Theatre, Claremont Showground, June 29 to July 13. Tickets at sppt.com.au.