Choose Your Own Adventures of Turtle Boy and Owl Loves Angeline

Join Haitian-American performer Emmanuel Elpenord for a unique double feature of interactive storytelling and puppetry that blends imagination with cultural roots.

In Choose Your Own Adventures of Turtle Boy, the audience helps shape the story as Turtle Boy—a young Black boy in turtle pajamas complete with an impenetrable shell—navigates a fast-paced action adventure. Each choice leads to a new challenge, creating a different story every time. Think John Wick meets Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, with humor, heart, and audience participation at its core.

The second piece, Owl Loves Angeline, draws on Haitian folklore and storytelling traditions to explore themes of love, longing, and connection. Told through puppetry and simple, poetic narration, the story follows an owl who becomes captivated by a woman named Angeline. The performance reflects Elpenord’s Haitian heritage and his passion for stories that resonate across cultures.

While at the museum, be sure to check out African Diaspora in the Americas, featuring works by Haitian artists in the newly reinstalled Reimagine African American Art galleries on the second floor.

For families of all ages (60 min.)