I'm still looking for ideas for to entartain kids with the Axtell Big-Bear.
Out of all my puppets, the Big-Bear seems to be the one that no one likes ! Help Guys .
Usually it's only very very young children that are afraid of it, and even then you can present it as your big "teddy bear". Make the bear timid and afraid of kids....reverse the psychology like Monsters Inc. did. Then as the kids do things in your routine (volunteers that come up to help) to bring the bear out of his fear...they can learn that he's a kind bear.
I was shocked to read that the bear was unpopular with the kids in your audience! Mine was a wedding gift about 13 years ago and he is definitely the crowd favorite, no matter what the age. I did come to realize late that he shouldn't be the first one on when the kids are preschoolers.
If you are worried about the teeth scaring little kids, bring out a cutesy puppet first, such as Oreo or a bird. This gets them eager to see more puppets. The bear can also wear a vest or hat. Mine wears a baseball hat quite often, or a Santa hat in December.
The biggest laughs come from my food jokes with the bear. The first thing out of his mouth is...
"Look at all this food!" I inform him that these are children. "I love children! They're delicious!"
Mr. Bear, tell them that you are glad to meet all of them.
"I am glad to eat all of you!"
That's not what I said! Now behave! The children are happy that you're here?
"What are they?"
They're happy.
"Good! I get a happy meal!"
(I generally use 2 food jokes before heading into the regular routine.) I even use my deepest carefree voice for the bear, and they love him. You may want to rent Disney's "Country Bear" movie to get ideas for voices or personality. I haven't seen it, but there are several bears in it.
Hi,
I've got a bear and all my audience love it, I like to pretend he's a very old bear, telling his stories, then he fall to sleep, then I ask a child from the audience to come and wake him up, I sometimes like to make Charlie (the bear) tell jokes, the kids love that!