La Choy and More!
And then we come to arguably the greatest Muppet commercial character ever, or at least he’d like you to think so–Delbert, the La Choy Dragon, a loud, over-confident, enormous, gallumphing creature who would arrive to help people with dinner by providing La Choy prepackaged Chinese food meals, which had been cooked in “real dragon fire”! Which he would illustrate by then breathing real fire onto the can, a hugely impressive special effects accomplishment for Muppets, Inc. at the time. What makes him so amusing is that Delbert doesn’t seem to have any clue of his own size, so often he’ll come charging into a situation, causing chaos all around him. You can watch probably his most famous ad, in which he surprises a mom and son in a grocery store, and ends up inadvertently setting a sign on fire and knocking over almost an entire aisle with a swing of his enormous tail, here.
Voiced by Jim and puppeteered by Frank Oz, he’s a very early version of the sort of life-sized, full-bodied Muppet the team would later perfect with Big Bird, Mr. Snuffleupagus, Sweetums, and others, all of whom would have internal monitors so the puppeteer(s) inside could see what they were doing. Delbert, however, didn’t, and didn’t have eyeholes either, so Oz would be performing him completely blind, needing to memorize his marks by counting his steps. On screen, this only adds to the dragon’s blissfully ignorantly klutzy nature.
And here he is, helping a sad bride, who doesn’t know how to cook…
…and a “wifeless husband” who is similarly useless in the kitchen (interestingly, no reason is given for the mom’s absence, whether it be death, divorce, or who knows? maybe she’s working, any of which is a pretty significant acknowledgement of the gradually shifting cultural norms of the time):
And, just like Scoop and Skip, Jim also introduced the La Choy Dragon in a self-mocking internal presentation, which you can view here. It’s similar to the first, in that it also has “backstage” footage, only here it’s of the Muppets team accidentally causing huge fires while trying to bring Delbert to life. There’s also a great recurring gag in which–when Rowlf does his cameo this time–they can only afford to pay him to say one word, “Howdy!” which he repeats over and over until Delbert finally frustratedly responds, “WILL YOU STOP THAT?!” ultimately attacking him.
The film also gives us a neat look at some highlights from ads and variety show appearances I wasn’t able to find elsewhere, all naturally filled with lots of explosions and large Muppet monsters devouring smaller Muppets. “You can see why the Muppets’ warm, gentle humor has endeared them to children of all ages,” the dragon says, without a trace of irony, while a Muppet executive responds, “Looks like a bunch of sickos, if you ask me!”
And last but not least, we come to what seems like a fitting way to sign off today: a Muppet commercial for…Muppet products! Yes, that’s right, long before they had their own show, the Muppets had grown so popular, they were able to sell plushies of themselves. And in this ad, Rowlf tells the audience about these products, announcing Rowlf, Kermit, and Snerf (a Muppet monster who appeared in early sketches that we haven’t yet seen, but we should get some more glimpses of later, at least on The Muppet Show) puppets. Apparently, Snerf never hit the market, but the others did.
And this commercial is indicative of the Muppets’ chaotic humor first in how Rowlf announces the Rowlf puppet but instead various others pop in, trying to jump the line so to speak, and then in how those plushies behave. For starters, the Kermit and Rowlf dolls speak in babyish voices, meant to show that they aren’t the “real” Kermit and Rowlf but versions of them to play with at home. Today, these voices and the slightly rounder, younger look of the faces can be seen to foreshadow Muppet Babies.
Jim with the “Ideal” Muppets.
But also, the ad then undercuts the cuteness factor by having the Kermit puppets threaten to bite people who don’t buy them and then even break their arms–but in adorable little voices. The fact that Rowlf is the reasonable one while everything else around him is going nuts again reiterates the fact that Kermit isn’t yet the (relatively) sane star of The Muppets. At this point, Rowlf is. Not that Rowlf will ever be one of the crazy Muppets, but it’s fascinating to see him as the prominent face of the company at this point. You can see that ad here and any of the ads I may have referenced in the above post that didn’t have separate links, in this compilation.
Phew! Tomorrow: a brief intermission with my review of the latest episode of The Muppets!