Caleb Fullam; puppeteer had flair for unusual

Caleb Fullam was a man of many hyphens: Puppeteer-punk rock singer-interior designer-drag queen.

''A lot of artists think they are unique, but he really was," Karen Larsen, artistic director of the Puppet Showplace Theatre in Brookline, said yesterday of Mr. Fullam, 53, who died of cancer Oct. 20 at his home in Hudson, N.Y.

''He wanted to push the limits of contemporary puppetry," said his brother Francis, of Chicago. ''He worked very hard on his productions for children, but puppetry for adults was his passion."

Puppet theater was not just kids' stuff to Mr. Fullam, who performed regularly at the Puppet Showplace. In addition to presenting standard fairy-tale fare for children, he adapted works by 19th century artist Aubrey Beardsley and 18th century composer Joseph Haydn and was sometimes billed as a ''radical gay puppeteer."

''I have gay characters in some things and some not," he said in a story published in the Globe in 2002. ''They're sort of underrepresented in the puppet world."

In 2000, Mr. Fullam and his Other Glove Theater presented a puppet show for adults, with a piece about a lesbian couple living in a Paris salon and a ballet pas de deux featuring a same-sex couple.

''Late in his career he specialized in puppet pieces with gay themes, but they were not outrageous," said Larsen. ''There was never anything salacious about them. They were just everyday characters who happened to be gay."

Mr. Fullam's puppets were works of art that he meticulously crafted from scraps of old clothing, jewelry, and bric-a-brac he collected at antique shows. But their beauty and the dramas he created for them sometimes went over the heads of his audience.

''He was born at the wrong time," said Larsen. ''His artistry was just so stunning, his work should have been performed in elegant salons for people with a knowledge of literature and history."

In 1982, Mr. Fullam joined the Underground Railway Theater and the Boston Symphony Orchestra to perform the musical comedy ''Till Eulenspiegel's Merry Pranks."

In 1984, he and his Tatterdemalion Puppet Company joined the Boston Premiere Ensemble in the American premier of Haydn's ''Die Feuerbrunst" (House Afire) in Harvard University's Sanders Theatre.

In 1989, he presented a multimedia piece called ''Power, Pain and Poison" in Provincetown. The work, which combined live performers and puppets, was described as dark Gilbert and Sullivan.

In 2000, he presented ''Aubrey Beardsley: a Singular Artist" at the Eugene O'Neill National Puppetry Conference in New York City.

''He was born in the wrong century," said his brother. ''His passions were puppetry, Aubrey Beardsley, and the aesthetic movements, and somehow he managed to combine them all."

Mr. Fullam was born in Princeton, N.J. in 1951. He studied with New York puppeteer Bil Baird.

''That's when it all came together for him," said his brother. ''Through puppetry he was able to combine his interests in theater, art, and writing."

Mr. Fullam was a colorful character with a penchant for pointed shoes and vintage clothing -- the brighter the colors the better.

He sang with several musical groups, including the kazoo band Kazoonheits, Honeybee and the Meadow Muffins, and Chuck Rocker and the Dirt Bombs featuring Desi Bollett, who was Mr. Fullam in drag. He also played the fairy godmother in an independent film version of ''Cinderella."

''He was extremely eccentric and extremely unique," said Dini Lamot, former singer for the Boston new wave band Human Sexual Response, for whom Mr. Fullam wrote songs.

A longtime resident of Allston, he moved to Hudson, N.Y, a few years ago and decorated his home with his puppets, plants, funky '50s lamps, and the ebonized arts and crafts furniture that he loved.

''He had a decorating style like no one else I know, " said Larsen.

''He loved to create his own little worlds," said his brother.

In addition to his other achievements, Mr. Fullam dabbled in poetry. Among the writings he left behind was this bit of doggerel, scrawled on the back of a hospital bill: ''The fine pursuit of truth is what we seek, whether it be glorious or be weak, shall it be found under golden dome or grace the table of a wooden home. So off we wander to experience opulence, or her foe, common sense."

In addition to his brother, he leaves his stepmother, Dorothy of Princeton; and another brother, Ross, of Jacksonville, Fla.

Memorial services will be held in New York and Brookline at times to be announced.