Three-headed dinosaurs. Slime creatures from another planet. Time-travelling scientists. All of the above figure in Ramshackle Theatre’s Sci-Fi Double Feature, and if it sounds like the stuff of long-ago drive-in movies, that’s the point. Calling from a break during technical rehearsals at the National Arts Centre in Ottawa, Brian Fidler, who created the show with Edward Westerhuis, says his initial inspiration came from Plan 9 From Outer Space and its ilk.

“I was doing research for another show, and I watched a whole slew of B-movies from the 1950s and 1960s,” Fidler says. “And I was really struck by their connection to the world of puppetry—just how crappy they looked, and how they must have had to hire someone, a puppeteer, to make a cardboard or papier-mâché rocket and hang a piece of string off of it, and pull it across the screen. So I started thinking about everything that had gone into making those early sci-fi movies, and that was the origin of the idea of putting it on the stage and having the audience get to peek behind the curtain of a sci-fi movie and see how it all works.”

In Sci-Fi Double Feature, Fidler and assistant puppeteer Claire Ness manipulate cardboard-cutout puppets while Westerhuis shoots the action, creating a one-off movie (with original music and sound design by Jordy Walker). Audience members can watch the story projected on a screen, but they can also see it being performed in front of them.

“Initially, I had sort of thought about the camera staying static, and perhaps moving in and out,” Fidler says. “But Edward’s a pretty energetic guy, and when he came onboard he started moving around with the camera, so it’s a full film in which the photographer is moving and getting different angles and shots.”

As the title indicates, there are two separate stories, or features. “The first feature is called Attack of the Slime-O-Trons,” Westerhuis says. “That’s about a benevolent royal family on the planet of Hasbro, and they make board games. They make the game Trouble, and they fashion the architecture of the game after [the inhabitants of] their neighbour planet, the Slime-O-Trons.”

In order to breathe the air of their home world, the Slime-O-Trons have evolved an air bladder, which Hasbro’s royals use as the model for their game’s Pop-O-Matic bubble. “So the Slime-O-Trons are offended, and they attack them,” Westerhuis continues. “The family escapes for Earth, where they are followed, and then the aliens attack Earth. But the core of that story is two intergalactic lovers who fall in love and have to fight off their enemies before they can be united.”

In the second feature, Last Day on Earth, a professor finds what he is convinced is fossil evidence of a three-headed dino he calls the Tri-Rex. Mocked by his fellow academics, he travels back in time with his dog in order to find definitive proof, only to arrive minutes before an impending mass extinction.

Ramshackle is performing Sci-Fi Double Feature as part of the rEvolver Theatre Festival, a presentation of Upintheair Theatre, the company behind the Walking Fish and Neanderthal Arts fests. This marks a rare foray into the world of kid-friendly fare for Upintheair.

“The show was kind of written for adults, but it has a strong appeal for kids, so as a result we do midnight shows that have sold out and kids’ matinees that have sold out,” Westerhuis notes. “I usually describe it as a true all-ages kind of a show. It looks really attractive for kids, but most adults—hipsters, young people, all ages—are really into the show.”

In other words, Sci-Fi Double Feature—which includes animated shorts screened before the show and during the intermission—is not intended to be a typical night out at the theatre.

“We have free popcorn at the venue, and we encourage people to dress up in sci-fi regalia or costumes,” Westerhuis says. “So that’s the atmosphere that we try to create and inspire people to come out for.”