🦖 Jurassic Puppets
Original Run: April 15 – May 7, 2016
Second Run: June 17 – July 30, 2022
The Playhouse on the Park Theatre – Phoenix, AZ

“Felt finds a way…” and then roars through the fourth wall.

What began with an inflatable T-Rex turned into one of All Puppet Players’ most jaw-droppingly ambitious productions. Jurassic Puppets started as a scrappy parody of Spielberg’s dinosaur classic—but evolved, quite literally, into something monstrous.

The 2016 premiere featured hand-made dinosaurs, a Seinfeld-loving Nedry, and a sea of ridiculous puppet moments. That first inflatable T-Rex might have been wobbly, but it helped the show do what only Fifty Shades had done before: sell out performances. Cardboard cows held Chick-fil-A signs, Jeff Goldblum was reborn through a long-necked bird puppet, and “prop failure as comedy” became gospel.

But it was the 2022 revival that truly left a mark. For the second run, APP imported a massive T-Rex puppet from China—a towering, eye-popping marvel performed from the inside via monitor feed. It was the largest, most expensive puppet APP had ever unleashed onstage. She was terrifying. She was glorious. She was worth every felt-covered penny.

More than a movie spoof, the second run solidified a shift: APP wasn’t just parodying films anymore—they were creating original theatrical events. The Jurassic gates were bigger. The effects were louder. The sets more immersive. The jokes still dirty, the chaos still intentional—but now it came wrapped in spectacle.

Audiences returned in droves. The second run didn’t just match the original’s energy—it crushed it under puppet feet. Bigger was better. The experiment worked. And All Puppet Players stomped forward into a new era of puppet mayhem.

Performances ran:
April 15 – May 7, 2016
June 17 – July 30, 2022
The Playhouse on the Park Theatre – Phoenix, AZ
(Cows were eaten. Remote helicopters crashed. And the felt got ferocious.)