PERPLEX

MacKenzie-Chaplet’s One Woman Show a Spectacular
While many theatrical productions consist of creating the production before the costumes, one local artist will perform a production doing just the opposite.
Heather MacKenzie-Chaplet will perform her one-woman production, “Perplex” at the Auburn Public Theater Friday and Saturday Oct 20th, 21st, 27th, 28th.
MacKenzie-Chaplet describes her production as a spectacular concert, with no real story, but instead a collection of costumes connecting the performance together.
“The purpose of theater is to educate and challenge our public by showing all types of productions, not just the same old play”, theater owner Angela Daddabbo said. “This is the first of its type here, but I don’t think anyone will leave saying it was boring”.
MacKenzie-Chaplet designed the production’s costumes before knowing what format it would take. Once the costumes were completed, music was created to accompany the costume during each act.
Live music and silent films highlight the different costumes that were made by MacKenzie-Chaplet.
A lot of her production ideas were inspired from a school she attended in Paris, France, during a two-year theatrical program.
After graduating from Brown University, majoring in theater, MacKenzie-Chaplet attended Jacques Lecoq International School of Theater, participating in one program focusing on theater features including mime and clowning.
“Visual impact of theater became very influential to me,” MacKenzie-Chaplet said.
After participating in one French production, MacKenzie-Chaplet said she disconnected with theater to have children and help her parents with their company, MacKenzie-Childs, an international design and manufacturing firm, back in the Unite States.
“Perplex” has been performed in Paris, but the Auburn performances will be its first public performance in the United States.
“It’s very fun working with something visual,” MacKenzie-Chaplet said. “The greatest experience has been learning to use video production. This is a learning experience for me.”
“Perplex” brings flat and folded remnants to life following the whims contained in their colors and textures to create sculptural clothing. MacKenzie-Chaplet wrote on her web site. The form the fabric takes on compels the body to move with a unique rhythm and gesture.
During the production, when MacKenzie-Chaplet leaves the stage to change into her next costume, four local musicians, including her husband, Nils, have the opportunity to improvise music as a silent film zooms in on the fabric that will be used during the next act.
“The title, ‘Perplex’, says a lot” Daddabbo said. “This is something brand new for theater. It’s highly creative and mixes all artistic disciplines.”
Staff writer Kristina Martino
- Auburn Citizen

There are people, myself included, who approach performance art with some trepidation. I always wonder how stupid I’ll feel if I don’t understand what is being offered, or worse, can’t appreciate what the rest of the audience seems to eat up.
This not a problem with “Perplex,” Heather MacKenzie-Chaplet’s performance piece where the costumes are the point of departure for the jazz-rock music and interpretive dance that are the core of the presentation. I didn’t understand some of it, but I don’t feel any more stupid than usual, and I found my appreciation of the piece was in proportion to its considerable entertainment value.
Perplex is the name MacKenzie-Chaplet has chosen for the character who populates this series of mini plays. Her creative process begins with a decision on what Perplex will wear for each song. She sculpts textiles and then writes the song, and the result is sometimes confusing, usually riveting and always interesting. The sound is like something you might hear if the Doors sopped by to jam with Charles Mingus – deep and brooding with wonderful riffs and a steady, driving back beat. Their work in the final, untitled number is superb. Her changes in pitch – often in the middle of a line – can make it difficult to understand her lyrics and are distracting, particularly earlier on. But her efforts in “Dry Clean” and “Mamma” are magnificent, clear, direct and honest.
By Tom Woods
- Auburn Citizen

A month ago, when Heather MacKenzie-Chaplet appeared as « Perplex, » her one-woman alter ego, in a show at Auburn Public Theater, it was both a local debut and a homecoming for the performer/designer.
In one piece, she wore a tartan plaid angel dress. In others, she wore sculptural dresses that were gathered, stuffed and sometimes built and suspended like lampshades off shoulders and skirt. It was an electric performance, with live improvised jazz, that drew upon word play, traditional clowning, European cabaret Singing and the visual playfulness of her better-known parents, Victoria and Richard MacKenzie-Childs.
For most of her 35 years, MacKenzie-Chaplet has been more heard about than seen, at least around Cayuga County. As a child, she created shows at the Morgan Opera House, in Aurora. She has lived some 15 years in Europe – in England studying dance, music and drama, in France studying performance and « falling in love » with Nils Chaplet, a Swedish-French artist and musician to whom she is married and with whom she collaborates artistically and shares two children, Wittika, 6 and Felix, 5.
For the last five years, the MacKenzie-Chaplet family lived in Paris. Last spring they touched down in King Ferry at the former home of her parents where Heather and Nils have since been living . . .
The Post-Standard recently interviewed Heather and Nils . . . in King Ferry.
What brings you back here?
Heather
It was quite spontaneous. We came to New York to do a show on the Yankee Ferry for the big party that Victoria and Richard throw for their Mild-Zany Check Society.
Nils
We decided it would be nice to sell Victoria and Richard’s new products and try to save this place and show the origins of their work, which is all here.
Do you feel isolated here?
Heather
If I can do my work I am happy. When I’m in Paris or New York, I can never figure out what there actually is to see, or where you should be, to be with the inspiring people.
Nils
Major cities have become very expensive and I think lost most of their soul. New York, Paris, even London. They’re all exciting but I don’t think they’re a nest for creation any more.
Is « Perplex » a collaborative composition between the two of you?
Heather
The seeds are definitely originating with me. We establish a kind of ambiance for each song we’re working on. Then I do the lyrics and the melodies. Then he does all the instrumentation, choosing the instruments and the sound.
Do you have an artistic vision for living here?
Heather
Our musical, artistic work is the most important thing in our lives. We want to be able to play as much as we can. We feel good about selling Victoria and Richard’s designs. We would love to start a little cafe, working with a local baker who does all organic things. We’d like to collaborate with a friend of ours, a green architect who is moving her. I would love to develop a clothing line that is respectful to the environment and to people.
By Dave Tobin
- Syracuse Post Standard

Translation in English Follows
Clôture du mois de la femme, à la Maison Folie
Perplex, une Américaine à Moulins
Avec un concert de la Brésilienne Renata Rosa, un DJ set de la graphiste parisienne Missil et la performance Japonaise Women’s flower, l’hommage aux créations féminines rendu par la Maison folie tout au long du mois, s’achèvera ce week-end par la performance de Perplex. L’artiste américaine en résidence à Moulins peaufinait cette semaine son « concert spectaculaire », un spectacle visuel et sonore qui allie chant, musique, chorégraphie, vidéo et surtout création textiles.
Le concept de cette création toute neuve met en valeur les multiples talents de cette petite femme à la fois chanteuse, danseuse, styliste et designer : un costume sculptural qu’elle crée lui inspire un mouvement, puis une ambiance sonore, et enfin des mots.De ce processus créatif naît une œuvre imagée et vivante, habillée par les musiciens d’origines et expériences variées dont s’est entouré Perplex. « Il est difficile de donner une étiquette a notre musique, vu que chaque morceau résulte de l’inspiration de Perplex sure le vêtement qu’elle crée.Chaque morceau est une partie de son univers », précisent les musiciens.
Alors que la création classique fait généralement émerger la mise en scène de la musique, Perplex fait évoluer des comptines pops aux accents électroniques, qui empruntent au groove et au jazz au gré de ses changements de costumes et des facettes de son univers imaginaire.
La Maison Folie de Moulins, qui a mis en valeur de très beaux projets de femmes, a été séduite par cet effort créatif original, celui d’une femme forte, riche de voyages et d’expériences variées, et qui « tente la survie dans un monde ou même la substance d’une tomate doit être considéré avec suspicion ».
Women’s Month at La Maison Folie
Closes with Perplex, and American in Moulins
After a concert of Brazilian Renata Rosa, a DJ set of the Parisian graphic designer Missil and the Japanese performance Women' S flower, the month long homage to female creations offered by La Maison Folie, will be completed this weekend by the performance of Perplex. The American artist in residence with Moulins spent the week preparing her "spectacular concert", a visual and sound spectacle which combines song, music, choreography, video and especially textile creation. The concept of this very new creation emphasizes the multiple talents of this small woman who is a singer, dancer, and designer all in one. The sculptural costumes that she creates inspires a movement, then a sonic ambiance, and finally melodies and words. Of this creative process is born a picturesque and lively work, accompanied by musicians of varied origins and experiences. "It is difficult to give a label to our music, considering each piece results from the inspiration of the clothing that Perplex creates. Each piece is a part of her universe", the musicians explain. Whereas in traditional creation the setting generally emerges as a result of the music, Perplex works the other way round. Perplex songs sound like pop nursery rhymes with electronic accents, which borrow from groove and jazz following the whims of costume changes and the facets of this imaginary universe. La Maison Folie, Moulins which emphasized very beautiful projects of women, was attracted to this original creative effort, that of a strong, rich woman of voyages and varied experiments, and who "tries to survive in a world where even the substance of a tomato must be considered with suspicion".


- La Voix du Nord