The Baffo Box Show: A Compact Cardboard Comedy

Presented by The Modern Times Theater with an opening act by The Boxcutter Collective

Doors @ 8pm, Show @ 8:30pm
$15 adv / $20 door

Performed in a one-of-a-kind suit-stage, this show packs classic hand puppetry, Dadaist ventriloquism, and stand-up comedy into a cardboard box and delivers it, with impeccable timing, live on stage.

Inside the box are the Baffos — two slapstick chaps who keep the sun, moon and everything else running on schedule. From the moment the lid opens, audiences are captivated as the Baffos juggle and dance their way through the day’s chores, despite the undeniable evidence that their world is changing. 

A daring work of puppetry and object manipulation, full of beautiful images, junk music sonatas, and Modern Times Theater’s unique brand of absurdist comedy. This re-envisioning of classic hand puppet forms is digital entertainment as it was meant to be: two hands, ten fingers, and no camera tricks. 

Puppeteered by Justin Lander and directed by Rose Friedman, The Baffo Box Show was supported by a 2022 Family Grant from the Jim Henson Foundation.

Modern Times Theater has been making and touring puppet shows and variety acts, and creating public community events since 2007. They pursue a radically divergent model of art making, creating venues in unlikely locations, and revitalizing the historic, run-down, and defunct. Working in populist theater forms, they seek to reinvent and reimagine classic American entertainment. 

Co-founders Rose Friedman and Justin Lander are a husband and wife duo, producers for Vermont Vaudeville and alumni of the Bread and Puppet Theater.