‘TikTok is like an old-school variety show': what's behind the surprising boom in ventriloquism?

The Guardian

5 days ago

It is the greatest duet, performed solo. Ventriloquism acts became a popular entertainment in the 18th century and have flickered in and out of favour ever since, with a particular heyday on TV in the 1970s and 80s. Now a new generation of performers are reimagining the practice of 'throwing your voice' to a puppet or dummy – and they are doing so not just in cabaret and comedy clubs but also on social media feeds.
The art form has such a rich history that its modern-day practitioners can be 'perceived as just doing an old thing', says 25-year-old Max Fulham, who is in Edinburgh with his debut fringe show, Full of Ham. Fulham fell in love with ventriloquism when he was nine, absorbing everything he could find about the craft online. 'I watched really old-school stuff like Ray Alan, Arthur Worsley and Terri Rogers … I have a massive appreciation for them.'
Despite learning his trade with conventional puppets, Fulham now uses more unusual tricks in his act. 'I think what a lot of ventriloquists are doing now is trying to modernise,' he says. In Full of Ham, this means audiences will be treated to sketch comedy, ventriloquism with objects, and some ventriloquism without anything that resembles a puppet at all. 'It is very stripped back. That's why it feels fresh,' Fulham says.
'The stuff without puppets feels like a new path,' he continues. In the show, Fulham uses his voice to become characters that exist only in 'the audience's imagination' while being 'an extension' of himself. 'It has been a lot of fun to play with … it is the first time I've felt I've been truly alone on stage.'
Fulham is not the only ventriloquist trying to push boundaries. The Australian David Salter, who performs the show An Evening With Dame Granny Smith, uses an apple as his puppet. 'The idea is that I'm having an interview with Australia's most famous apple of screen and stage,' he says. All he has to do to prepare his onstage companion is bite a face into the fruit 'and leave it in the fridge for a couple of days', he says. 'It is that simple. But there's something very whimsical about a puppet that sets out a childlike imagination.'
Salter learned this firsthand. He began his career performing with a sock puppet at children's parties, before branching out into work for older audiences. He cites his early inspirations as Nina Conti and fellow Australian Shari Lewis. While the content of his shows has shifted dramatically, one thing has remained constant. With ventriloquism, the audience are 'having a shared hallucination', he says. 'You have to leave your sense of disbelief at the door.'
Believing in the puppet is essential for performers, too. Lachlan Werner's first show, 2023's Voices of Evil, was created for his witch puppet, Brew, which he had saved up for weeks to buy from a toy shop in Worcester when he was seven. 'We're like old friends,' he says. 'I will talk to her off stage, and before a gig I'll be like, 'Are you ready?''
For Werner, this relationship makes his performance. 'It feels different to being on stage with someone else, but I do feel as if I always have backup,' he says, specifically mentioning the moments his puppet has 'saved him' from a flop. 'There is a strange thing where, if I think I'm not going to be funny today, I can look at Brew and she seems to say, 'I'm good, we'll be OK.''
The relationship between performer and puppet has always been central to ventriloquism's odd allure. At the peak of his career, the now 80-year-old Roger De Courcey appeared on the 1976 Royal Variety Performance and made regular TV appearances with his sidekick, the growly teddy Nookie Bear. 'You always feel there are two of you. You must believe in the bear,' he says. De Courcey came up during ventriloquism's golden age, when it dominated variety shows, primetime TV and children's programming. He credits his success to strong comic timing. 'I was lucky because I was funny,' he says. 'You've got to be able to think on your feet, just like a comic.' What drew him to ventriloquism was the licence it offered. 'As a 'vent', you have a freedom because you can say what you want. It's not you, it's that little fellow sitting on your knee.' A puppet can get away with saying what a person can't.
The art form still thrives on provocation. In Werner's new show, WonderTwunk, he performs alongside a 'really horrible puppet' that is nearly lifesize. 'He's like the villain of the piece, just a really icky character – the only puppet I have that I don't like to be around.' For Werner, as with many ventriloquists, the key lies in building a full, believable persona.
But which comes first: the puppet or its personality? For Fulham, the puppet he has used most over the years – Grandad – is rooted in old ventriloquist tropes. 'I'm fully aware that a lot of ventriloquists in the past, and still now, will have an old man character,' he says. 'It is sort of the archetypal puppet.'
One of Werner's most recent creations came from a 'horrid boss character' he used to portray at gigs. 'I was playing him with my own body and voice, and then wanted him in the show,' Werner says. Now, a version of him is in WonderTwunk too: a full-sized dad character, designed by puppeteer and prop-maker Freddie Hayes. 'He's a puppet that feels like he's been grown out of me … he's like a mix of Donald Trump, Cruella de Vil and Liza Minnelli,' says Werner.
The performer known as Steph Ventriloquist, meanwhile, specifically ordered and designed one of her puppets, Kaylee, to be a parody of the Kardashians. 'I knew exactly what her voice was going to be before I even got her,' she says.
No matter how surreal the act, things ultimately always come back to the performer and their hand. Good technique matters – even though De Courcey insists throughout our conversation that he 'got away with' not having much of it. Still, most ventriloquists will have spent hours in front of the mirror, learning to keep their lips perfectly still. Steph first picked up a puppet during lockdown, and dedicated months to mastering the subtle arts of mouth control and hand movement. 'I had all this time on my hands, so I thought, 'OK, let's learn how to do this,'' she says. It took her around nine months to 'get good', she estimates, and she talks me through the fine details that made the difference: keeping the jaw relaxed, placing the tongue precisely, knowing which letters are most challenging. 'I spent more hours than I'd like to admit looking at myself. You have to, so you can see which words work.'
Such precision is more important than ever in the age of social media, where tight camera angles leave no margin for error. Steph now has more than 22,000 followers on TikTok, where she regularly posts clips with her puppets. 'You see quite a few ventriloquists on TikTok,' she says. 'And I think those videos are making people stop and go: 'OK, that's actually quite cool.''
Fulham believes ventriloquism's growing visibility online is key to its resurgence. 'It has a bit of a visual hook that stops people scrolling,' he says. 'It's probably something most people haven't seen before.' The short-form content mirrors the quick bursts of performance that audiences would see from ventriloquists on old variety show bills, too. 'A ventriloquist would do, like, one minute of something on a TV show – that was all the time they had,' says Werner. 'TikTok feels like that very old-school variety thing, where you see a tiny gimmick and then they go off again.'
Salter is confident that anyone who puts their mind to it can become a ventriloquist. When he began, he took out a book from the library and binge-watched YouTube videos. 'If you watch the best people do it, you'll really get a sense for the craft,' he says. 'But you have to really love it, because it does take a lot of time and effort.'
For those who do put in the hours, the reward is a kind of magic: the ability to bring a character to life with only your hands, your voice and a great deal of imagination. 'It is a wonderful thing,' says De Courcey. 'With Nookie Bear, I could tell anyone to fuck off and it didn't matter.'
Will the art ever regain the heights of De Courcey's television heyday? Fulham isn't so sure. 'Things have moved to the internet now,' he says. 'There isn't that same culture of late-night TV any more.' Salter thinks it is a possibility: 'It is still a niche act. But look what happened with Drag Race … the underground can just pop on to TV and become mainstream.' Whatever happens next, it is clear that a whole new generation of ventriloquists have begun to find their voices.
Max Fulham: Full of Ham is at Pleasance Courtyard until 25 August. Lachlan Werner: WonderTwunk is at Pleasance Dome until 24 August. An Evening with Dame Granny Smith is at Underbelly George Square until 25 August. Steph Ventriloquist is on TikTok.