As a colleague of Gerry Seinfeld and Gary Shandling (aka Larry Sanders), David Strassman watched on as his comedy chums left behind dank New York comedy clubs to become international stars, leaving him with his hand perpetually stuck up a wooden puppet's behind. "As a ventriloquist, people just don't want to know," he says. "It was fine for Gerry and Gary doing stand-up but whenever I tried to push my career along, people would say ventriloquism is dead, forget it kid and get yourself a stand-up act."
The problem at the time, and indeed still, is that the craft of ventriloquism has been tainted by association with crummy end-of-the-pier acts whose greatest moment consists of saying "gottle of geer". Ventriloquism just wasn't sexy and its core audience of young, impressionable children could not sustain a career. Strassman, aged 38 and from California, decided to single-handedly re-invent the craft that he had been practising since he was 12. Not wanting to have his puppets end up alongside Lord Charles and Nookie Bear in the puppet retirement home, he turned his main act, Chuck Wood, into an evil little bastard who shocked audiences out of their complacency and then invested in a stage act that incorporates lights, loud music and some state-of-the-art technology. It's all a long way from the vaudeville image of one man and a battered suitcase.
Always a massive favourite at the Edinburgh Festival, it was during the festival that Strassman's developed his highly impressive, slightly scary, party piece: While bantering away with Chuck on stage, the two have a row and start screaming and swearing at each other. Strassman tells the puppet he's had enough, removes his hand from Chuck's back and walks offstage. The lights dim and Chuck is left sitting on a stool by himself. After a minute or so, and with Strassman nowhere in sight, Chuck raises his head, asks the audience "has that Strassman bastard gone yet?" and then proceeds to do the show on his own. Part magic, part pure theatricals, there's little point explaining how he accomplishes this; suffice to say that Strassman has a few fans who work for the space agency NASA who equipped him with some pretty awesome new technology.
Although Strassman and Chuck form the centre of the set, he's got a whole range of supporting puppets to help him along. Chief among these is Ted E. Bear, a simple-minded, sloppy and sentimental bear who is the direct antithesis of the scabrous Chuck. Ted E. Bear needs constant emotional support from members of the audience so Strassman brings him around the theatre and if anyone refuses to hug him, you'll typically hear the rest of the crowd shut out: "Hug The Bear". It's all quite bizarre. When Strassman works both Chuck and Ted E. together, you can delight at Chuck's vicious jealousy of Ted E. - he verbally abuses him and spits into his face. He also has an amazing trio of singing dinosaurs (all worked by Strassman) who perform choreographed renditions of well-known songs such as Bohemian Rhapsody; a new, as yet unnamed alien puppet; and a baby puppet called Little Ricky. The real fun and games start when another new creation Beaky The Beaver makes his entrance - Beaky is a cute mammal with only one thing on his mind - finding wood to eat. Chuck Wood is not Beaky's number one fan. The show is a blast and will swiftly disabuse you of any lingering prejudice about "gottle of geer" ventriloquists.
"What I do has been called `alternative' ventriloquism," says Strassman, "but I think that's only because traditional ventriloquists are too presentational, in that the comedy is only in the fact that they are making a puppet speak. I try to bring it further than that, and I think I'm at a stage now where the material that Chuck and all the other puppets use would work equally as well if it was a bunch of actors on stage reciting the same lines."
Chuck is such a nasty little git - what's his problem? "He's got a real angry, belligerent persona. He often throws up all over people sitting in the front row! Chuck really isn't a ventriloquist's doll and I've spent a lot of time researching his personality. He suffers from Pinocchio syndrome - he wants to be a real boy but he knows he can't. He knows he's only alive when I give him life so he's angry and he takes it out on me and on poor Ted E. Bear. The bit where he comes to life by himself is always really strange because for audiences who haven't seen it before, it's quite scary. Backstage I can hear them going `Oh My God, the puppet is really alive and he's on the loose'. And a few times people have run towards the exits because they're frightened.
"Something like that really blurs the traditional distinction between man and puppet but my puppets are not real to me until I put my hands on their levers. When I look at Chuck and I'm not working him, he represents a machine that is my tool, like a violin or a trumpet. But on stage I have to give him life and believe it, or the audience won't."
Because of the nature of his act, Strassman is not a purist or trainspotter about his technique: "My lips quiver a bit and my throat moves whenever I talk. But I hope that in the first few seconds of my show you just forget all about the whole ventriloquism thing because there's so much to take in regarding the character. It's when a guy doesn't have a strong enough character you're going to say `I saw his lips move' . . . "
It's always been a myth that ventriloquists were able to "throw" their voice - a myth largely propagated by ventriloquists themselves. "There is no such thing as throwing your voice, it's a nonsense," he says. "Ventriloquism is achieved by articulating with your tongue instead of with your lips - like we do in everyday speech. When you have the ability to articulate words with your tongue and hence with your mouth closed, you're a ventriloquist. It's as simple and as difficult as that".
Both Michael Redgrave in Dead Of Night and Anthony Hopkins in Magic have played roles of ventriloquists in films, where they have a case of split personality and find that the puppet takes over their own sense of consciousness. Any possibility of that happening to you, Mr Strassman? "Not at all," replies Chuck Wood from inside his suitcase.
David Strassman and his amazing array of puppets play The Opera House, Cork on April 19th; The Olympia Theatre, Dublin from April 20th to April 25th inclusive and The Ulster Hall, Belfast on April 26th. Do yourself a favour and don't sit in the front row.