Punch and Judy take on ex-PM Tony Blair... and Queen Victoria too

Dozens of puppeteers gathered in central London to celebrate 350 years of the Punch and Judy show, an anarchic English seaside entertainment known for its slapstick and casual violence.

Punch and Judy pokes fun at all the establishment, but it’s got a lot of heart

On the second of two days of festivities, Punch and Judy men and women – known as “professors” – took their hand puppets on a procession in London’s Covent Garden, staged shows for hundreds of children and held a church service with the red-nosed Mr Punch in the pulpit.

“Punch and Judy pokes fun at all the establishment, but it’s got a lot of heart,” said Maggie Pinhorn, organiser of the events, which commemorate the first recorded mention of Punch and Judy by diarist Samuel Pepys.

The show, performed by a single puppeteer in a striped booth, features the outrageous Mr Punch, who initially appears happy with his wife Judy and their baby before things go downhill when he is asked to babysit.

He fails terribly, sometimes even feeding the baby into a sausage machine, before getting into a fight with his returning wife, then a policeman, plus usually a crocodile and a ghost.

Punch fights off his opponents − who can also include a devil, a doctor and a hangman − using a stick, the original “slapstick”, in a story descended from the Italian Commedia dell’Arte and its long-nosed character Pulcinella.

Children screamed with delight as they watched a series of shows in different booths dotted around the central London venue, each with its own special features, including French, Japanese and US versions.

Puppeteers insert a “swazzle”, or two pieces of metal bound with fabric, into the roof of their mouths to produce the show’s trademark squeaky voices.

“It’s pantomime, it’s a live cartoon,” said Katey Wilde, 40, who performs in the seaside town of Brighton as Professor Peanut, having learned the art from her father aged 17.

She mainly performs in schools, where about half of the children have never heard of Punch and Judy before.

“The reaction is always the same,”she said. “They love it. They can shout at the characters, they can change allegiances, they love it.”

Punch and Judy’s popularity waned in the 1980s and 1990s as critics objected to what they saw as a ruthless portrayal of domestic violence but Ms Wilde said Punch have weathered the storm.

“It’s not violence, it’s physical comedy,” said Ms Wilde. “It’s much too knockabout and silly to compare with real life − that actually trivialises problems in real life.

Professor Patel, otherwise known as Aftab Khan, a puppeteer, stilt-walker and Elvis impersonator from Enfield, said Punch could “lend itself to a lot of different cultures”.

His Indian-flavoured show Punjeet and Judy-Gee features Bollywood music and turbaned puppets.

“It’s about arranged marriages, domestic violence and infanticide − it’s a family show!” he said.

Organiser Ms Pinhorn has run a yearly Punch festival for 37 years. “It doesn’t matter how bad he is. Children always love it,” she said.

Pepys, known for his frank and colourful account of 17th century London, wrote on May 9, 1662 that he had been to Covent Garden “to see an Italian puppet play that is within the rails there, which is very pretty, the best that ever I saw”.