The Sonic the Hedgehog Puppet Show performed 3-4 half hour shows daily in Sega World Sydney throughout 1998-99.
It was performed on center stage, pretty much in the middle of Sega World next to the food court. People could dine at their tables while watching the show.
The show was designed, written, produced and performed by Phillip Einfeld Puppetoons. It involved 2 puppeteers and a live hostess.
Dr. Robotnik had devised a plan to finally defeat his arch enemy Sonic. He has concocted a robot making machine that would build the ultimate, evil, robot with every device needed to catch Sonic. With the help of his buddies Tails and Princess Sally, Sonic defeats the robot (Grounder) who turns out to be a bit slow physically and mentally. Robotnik blasts off back to his secret laboratory in anger and everyone lives happily ever after.
Originally, a show with dancers and costumed characters performed on the stage. The soundtrack you have heard is from that show. I think I may have the puppet show sound track in my files somewhere but it could take some time to find it.
When Sega decided to disband the original stage show, due to it not being very dynamic, late 1997, I was brought in to replace it with the puppetshow and some animatronic displays.
I redesigned the stage to represent planet Mobius, on either end were magic mountains, every 15mins except during show times, audio animatronic Sonic and Tails characters rose out of top of mountains and spoke to each other and audience, anouncing show times and upcoming events in Sega World. In center of stage stood the large, fully sculpted puppet theatre. Perched above the theatre was a big ,purple, animatronic bird that spoke to the audience. Above the stage was a large vid screen. Segments of the puppet show where filmed and appeared on the screen i.e when Robotnik blasts off in his space ship he is seen flying across a planet strewn sky above the audience (on the screen).
The puppets were large, muppet style creations, Sonic, Tails, Princess Sally, Dr. Robotnik and Grounder the Robot. A large 'Robot making Machine' prop was made along with special Sonic hats for children chosen from audience to wear. The show included much audience participation. I had 3 original songs recorded (I attached the lyrics).
I used all my own people for the voices (all approved by Sega) From memory I voiced Grounder, Dennis White voiced Dr.Robotnik, and Sonic, Tails and Sally were voiced by Alexis Nagy. The original music and songs were written and produced by myself and Mark Rosenberg.
Wow. That's a lot of never-before-seen info! Who would have guessed that there were two shows? Phillip was also kind enough to scan some old photos of the show and send them to me. Here's some of the best ones:
It's Sonic the puppet-hog! I think he's kinda cute...
Say hello, Tails! I think he's the best puppet in the show.
Wow, Robotnik-puppet is huge!
Everybody loves Sally! Although, she kind of reminds me of Tails Doll...
The show relied heavily on lucky audience participants like these. That poor kid with the guitar looks pretty confused.
And finally, my favorite picture of the lot, the Magic Mountains! These are animatronics that pop out of the mountains every now and then to do announcements. I LOL at
Tails' expression. And look at cute little peek-a-boo Sonic. He's just snooping as usual like some kind of Sega spy-robot.
That's all for now, folks! But there are song lyrics, concept art, and even more pictures in this zip file, which contains everything show-related that Einfeld sent me. A huge thank you to Philip Einfeld! Without his generosity, this show would have been forgotten.
