Brad Lowe of Clarkston has been a puppeteer since he was 5.

By EMILY PRAWDZIK GENOFF

Of The Oakland Press

Most people spend years debating their career paths. From there, they go to school, typically spending four years in college, waiting until they’re about 22 before they begin their careers.

Brad Lowe of Clarkston skipped all of this. He’s known what he’s wanted to do, and has been doing it, since he was 5.

Lowe is a puppeteer.

Like many youngsters, Lowe made homemade puppets and put on puppet shows for neighborhood friends. His childhood hobby grew into a passion and, by the time he was in junior high, Lowe was being asked to perform at schools and birthday parties. Today, he is a full-time puppeteer, doing work on television, film, festivals and live shows.

Most recently he was hired by Jennifer Tuttle, a teacher at Atwood Elementary School of L’anse Creuse Public Schools, to create puppets for an educational math video.

Tuttle, a resident of New Baltimore, was the winner of the Live Your Dream contest, created by best-selling author and entrepreneur Jake Steinfeld. The contest gave entrepreneurs the chance to present their business ideas and potentially win $200,000.

Tuttle was chosen as the winner of this nationwide competition for her creation of MathMosis, a teaching method designed to educate kindergarten through third-graders in math through music, visual learning, drama and movement. Tuttle has long since applied this method in her own classroom.

“I was excited but I knew I had a lot of work ahead of me,” Tuttle said. “It was a little bit overwhelming and a complete whirlwind but it was a lot of fun though. I’ve been having a lot of fun doing this.”

With her prize money, she was able to launch her own business and create products, for parents and teachers, in the form of CDs, videos, games and posters.

Lowe created 13 puppets for Tuttle, including a giraffe, monkey, bunny, penguin and pig.

The children, Tuttle said, love the puppets.

“He’s very, very talented,” she said.

Much of Lowe’s influence, in his early days, came from the shows many of the late baby boomers grew up with.

“And there were plenty of television shows that had puppets,” he said. “Jim Henson with The Ed Sullivan Show, and the Jimmy Dean Show, he had puppets, and I was in my teens when they started Sesame Street.”

Today, Lowe takes pride in taking the youngest generation away from video games and computers and back to the simplicity of using their imaginations.

“They’re not really searching their creative imagination anymore,” he said. “Once we do a show, it sparks their imagination.”

Lowe also enjoys entertaining big “kids,” many of whom can be found at Fortune 500 companies.

“The puppet is the devil’s advocate and can say things, at sales meetings or conventions, that nobody would say to the CEO,” he said. “That creates comedy.”

His greatest feeling of accomplishment, Lowe says, is when he uses his puppets with special needs children.

“It’s a great opportunity for kids to express themselves and also be able to work with other kids,” he said. “Some of the special needs kids might have a problem with being too close to another individual and when they work with puppets, that doesn’t even come to mind for them. They’re so involved with the puppets that they forget they’re in that situation.”

Lowe’s talents haven’t gone unnoticed. He’s the recipient of many awards, including the 2006 Paul McFarland Award, a national award presented by fellow puppeteers, and an Emmy Award, for a San Francisco television show he worked on years ago, “Hot Fudge.”

Lowe’s puppets are handmade, mostly by him, in a a 40-by-60 foot pole barn behind his home.

“That’s the magical place, back there,” he said.

Countless colorful faces and personalities, in the form of hand puppets, electronic puppets, marionettes and more, fill Lowe’s Clarkston barn. Lowe held up a bag of white ping pong balls, each of them covered with a single black dot.

“Here are the eyes,” he said.

Paint brushes, rolls of fabric, glue, paint, and just about anything one would need to create a puppet can be found here. It was a dream when Lowe was a child, and now his reality as an adult.

“I’d dream about being on Johnny Carson and laughing about the hard times,” Lowe recalled. “I was doing what I loved to do and I’m still doing what I love to do. My parents told me years and years ago that if you do something you love, find a way to make a living and make money from it. There are too many people who go to jobs they hate every day, but I don’t.

“I don’t even call it work,” he added. “It’s having fun, entertaining people and making people happy.”



Contact staff writer Emily Prawdzik Genoff at (248) 745-4639 or emily.genoff@oakpress.com.