AN ARTIST RESPONDS TO WAR

The First Documentary About Peter Schumann and the Bread & Puppet Theater In Over 20 Years

Vermont Film Tour
A Benefit Fundraiser for the Bread and Puppet Film Project
Saturday, July 18 at 4pm & 7pm • $15 in advance • $20 at the door (No one will be turned away for lack of funds)
The Savoy Theater, 26 Main Street, Montpelier, VT 05602

Join filmmaker Robbie Leppzer, for the Montpelier screening of AN ARTIST RESPONDS TO WAR, a vibrant portrait of Peter Schumann, the visionary founder of the Bread & Puppet Theater, whose six decades of radical political performance have been forged from a single, searing childhood question: how do we as humans respond to the madness of war and violence?

Born in Nazi Germany and shaped by the brutal reality of war via the aerial bombardments he experienced as a child, Schumann channeled this trauma into one of the most iconic and boundary-breaking theater companies in the world. Bread & Puppet came of age in the Vietnam War street protests of 1960s New York, and grew into its full form on a 250-acre Vermont farm in the 1970s, where the landscape itself became a stage that draws tens of thousands to its epic, large-scale spectacles.

Decades later, as international norms collapse and atrocities unfold in Gaza in plain sight, Schumann — now 91 and still working with fierce urgency — finds his life’s central question more pressing than ever. Drawing on originally shot footage and a remarkable archive of spanning more than 40 years, the film offers an intimate window into the man, his art, and his unbroken faith that creativity can stand against the brutality of power.

In an age desperate for hopeful figures of cultural resistance, AN ARTIST RESPONDS TO WAR is a testament to the radical, enduring idea that art is not a retreat from the world — it is a way of fighting for it.

Following the screening of AN ARTIST RESPONDS TO WAR, which runs 45 minutes, there will be a post-screening discussion with filmmaker Robbie Leppzer and other guest panelists.