Fünf auf dem Apfelstern
Synopsis
The story begins when a box with five souvenir puppets falls overboard from a ship and, after an unexpected journey through space, lands on the "Apfelstern," a planet inhabited by the Dergeln. The puppets—the sailor Heiko Zweilinks-Zweirechts, the princess Ria from Rio, the Chinaboy, the Matryoshka doll Grusinchen, and a pufferfish—must overcome the Dergeln's initial distrust. Together, they embark on an adventure to protect the planet from a giant worm and find their way back home.
Context & Trivia
Fünf auf dem Apfelstern was a marionette production by the Augsburger Puppenkiste, filmed in 1981. The four-episode series, each half an hour long, was written and directed by Sepp Strubel, who also published the story as a children's book. The Augsburger Puppenkiste is a renowned marionette theater in Germany, known for its television productions since 1953. For this series, the puppets were carved from linden wood, and some characters were built in different sizes to suit the filming requirements. The main puppets include the sailor Heiko Zweilinks-Zweirechts, the porcelain princess Ria from Rio, the Matryoshka doll Grusinchen from Grusinia, the Chinaboy from Hong Kong, and a pufferfish. The story is distinctive for its unusual setting on an apple-shaped planet in space, inhabited by the Dergeln, who communicate solely with the word "Dergel" in various intonations.
Puppet companies
Augsburger Puppenkiste
Direction
Sepp Strubel
Writing
Sepp Strubel
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