If you have ever been to a show by Dead Puppet Society you will have marvelled at the magic.

Laser Beak Man, Storm Boy, Holding Achilles (last year’s Brisbane Festival sensation) and others have charmed audiences. Their runaway hit The Wider Earth is a hugely entertaining and edifying piece about Charles Darwin’s Voyages on The Beagle with all the wonderful creatures brought to life on stage with the ingenious and charming puppetry that Dead Puppet Society (DPS) is famous for.

That show toured Australia and played a season at London’s famous Natural History Museum to great acclaim. Prince Harry and Meghan Markle famously attended and said they loved the show. That was before things went pear-shaped, royally speaking. It was presented in conjunction with London-based producer Trish Wadley, a Brissie girl who also worked with DPS on their Australian tour of The Wider Earth.

DPS creative director David Morton, writer of The Wider Earth., runs DPS with his partner in life and theatre, Nicholas Paine as executive producer.

Morton promises that The Wider Earth, with its Galapagos tortoise and other critters, will return to the Brisbane stage eventually. He shares the news that the company is now planning to tour it to Asia in 2025.

Of course, fans want to know when their next new production will take the stage here and Morton promises news about that too. Soon. We will just have to be patient.

However, there is a treat in store on the near horizon, THE DPS LAB, which comes to The Princess Theatre on October 24.

This show will feature three bite-sized showcases or original works from local and emerging and independent artists, each work created as part of DPS Academy, the company’s flagship artist training program and incubator for new design-led work.

David Morton says the young participants are “all working in forms of theatre that make use of strong visual storytelling”.

“It’s a highly collaborative way of working,” Mortons say. “It’s something Dead Puppets believes in. Building a career in theatre takes so long and needs so much support. We’ve been supported and its wonderful to give back to that ecology.”

The Wider Earth was a box office hit originally developed at St Ann’s Puppet lab at St Ann’s Warehouse in Brooklyn, New York City, in 2014. It premiered at Queensland Theatre in 2016.

Executive director Nicholas Paine says he and the team at DPS are passionate about providing similar pathways and opportunities that were made available to them as emerging theatre practitioners.

“As an established Queensland-based company we want to provide the same kind of safe and supportive environment to experiment and take risks which we valued so highly when we were starting out,” Paine says.

DPS Academy runs in the building next door to The Princess Theatre in Woolloongabba, recently restored to its former glory. The theatre is now a partner with DPS Academy much to the delight of The Princess Theatre’s creative director, Dave Sleswick.

“We are incredibly lucky to have this internationally renowned ensemble based in the city building the cultural fabric of Brisbane,” Sleswick says. “They are providing opportunities for local and emerging artists to inhabit our heritage venue.”

Being next door makes the leap from lab to stage easy for the three new works we will see next month.

Emmy Moore’s piece Bucket Boy Takes Flight features striking projections and physical theatre and is a one person show delving into the surreal. Playwright and artist Esther Dougherty’s piece Fitzgerald Sunbeam is “a queer comedy for anyone who has felt like running way and starting their life from scratch”.

The Hearth is by Jordan Riley and Blake Hohenhaus from Lunch Friends, a new collective. They will be joined by multidisciplinary artists Jiordie Lobwein, Grace Lofting and Alex Riley for The Hearth which explores the effects of modern consumerism on the planet and our homes.

Esther Dougherty says that “having Dead Puppet Society alongside this early development to offer guidance and support is a big boost”.

As well as attending the show you can drop by DPS headquarters next door to The Princess Theatre anytime. The company now has a gallery shopfront where you can purchase artworks based on their iconic puppets and they have created new works that means you can now have a unique DPS sculpture in your home. There are bees and dragonflies and marine creatures and David Morton says they have added local birdlife including rosellas and even a tawny frogmouth. There are pelicans too as a nod to the much-loved Mr Percival in Storm Boy.

“People are often dropping by,” Morton says. “The wall between the gallery space at the front and the workshop is transparent so people can see what is going on.” Wave if you’re passing, they’re a friendly lot.

THE DPS LAB is on at The Princess Theatre October 24

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