The Muppet Show 1.15: ‘Candice Bergen’...
With Candice Bergen, The Muppet Show had a perfect opportunity to concoct a classic episode. After all, it was rare for them to find a guest so comfortable with puppets. In fact, she had likely spent most of her younger years surrounded by them, given that her father was the great Edgar Bergen, one of America’s foremost puppeteers...
The Muppet Show 1.14: “Sandy Duncan”...
After at least a handful of uneven episodes–sometimes due to not utilizing a great guest star to their best advantage and other times due to a middling performance by a guest star dragging the proceedings down a bit–The Muppet Show finally finds its footing again with the Sandy Duncan episode, which benefits from a delightful...
The Muppet Show 1.13: “Bruce Forsyth”...
With the Bruce Forsyth episode, we have yet another mostly lackluster celebrity appearance. This isn’t helped by the fact that, despite Kermit extolling his virtues and calling him a “one-man variety show,” his singing, dancing, and comedic stylings fail to impress–or at least fail to impress a modern eye. I...
The Muppet Show 1.12: “Peter Ustinov”...
The Peter Ustinov episode of The Muppet Show is a perfect example of how, no matter how iconic and storied the guest star, whenever the Muppets failed to incorporate them into any musical numbers, the show usually suffered, particularly in the first season, when the writers made up for non-singing guests’ lack of singing by featuring...
The Muppet Show 1.11: “Lena Horne”...
Growing up, my only real point of reference for Lena Horne was that she was a celebrity who appeared on Sesame Street, but in her relatively brief scenes, she exuded a warm, gentle glow that, even at a young age, made me sense that she was one of those people who really got the Muppets. She and they seemed to fit together so naturally that I...
The Muppet Show 1.09: ‘Charles Aznavour̵...
In previous posts, I spoke of how, in the first season, before The Muppet Show became a massive hit and celebrity guest stars were banging down the doors to appear, the show paid host to a number of lower-tier stars who were friends of the producers, doing them favors. Well, given that the singer, Charles Aznavour, who Kermit calls an...
The Muppet Show 1.08: “Paul Williams”...
Remarkably, the Paul Williams episode of The Muppet Show received an Emmy nomination for Best Writing on a Variety Show. Unfortunately, the reason I find it remarkable is that it is easily the most poorly written episode up to this point with a higher-than-usual number of jokes that completely fail to land–for example, the Newsman...
1969-1970 Variety Show Appearances
The original “Mahna Mahna”.
Before proceeding on with Sesame Street‘s second season, today I took a look at a number of variety show appearances that Jim Henson and his Muppets team continued to do, both during Sesame Street‘s opening season and afterwards, during the summer hiatus.
The first is an extremely significant moment in Muppet history, being the debut of one of their most iconic songs and sketches, “Mahna Mahna”! Well, technically it was the second time the Muppets had used it. The first was in a 1969 Sesame Street sketch, which you can watch here, and which feels practically primitive today because, rather than the pink, furry, snoutish, round-mouthed Snowths, who have become indelibly linked to the song, the back-up singers are simply two nondescript Anything
Read MoreThe Muppets 1.08: “Too Hot To Handler”
Scooter goes on a date with Chelsea Handler.
So far, The Muppets has had a mix of episodes that were mostly fantastic and ones that were more uneven, with genuinely brilliant elements side-by-side with ones that just didn’t work very well, for various reasons–plotting, characterization, what have you. Tonight’s, “Too Hot to Handler,” however, is the first that doesn’t inspire a rave nor a significant complaint from me.
I wouldn’t go so far as to say “it’s just there,” because there’s a lot about it I did enjoy, mostly revolving around Scooter’s surprising romance with Chelsea Handler of all people, but overall, it falls significantly short of exceptional while also not containing anything particularly objectionable. After two truly terrific episodes, this one is…perfectly all right, and if that
Read MoreSesame St S1: Bert & Ernie, Pt 2
Ernie shows Bert his treasure map.
And now my coverage of Bert and Ernie’s Season 1 sketches continues! Yesterday, I watched “Egg on the Counter,” whose punchline revolved around Ernie taking a line of Bert’s (“Drop it!”) literally. In today’s first clip, we get another fun, literal joke twist in “Ernie’s Treasure Map,” (06:00-08:02), when Ernie leads a reluctant Bert on a hunt for buried treasure in the apartment. “X Marks the Spot!” he says, and just when Bert finally succumbs to the thrill of the chase, Bert uncovers a hidden chest that does have a treasure…the letter X! Odds are, Ernie being Ernie, that he actually set this whole joke up, but that’s never confirmed.
Ernie definitely gets the better of him, however, in “Bert and Ernie Share
Read MoreSesame St S1: Bert & Ernie
Bert complains about Ernie’s mess.
Today we focus on that dynamic duo, Bert and Ernie. I didn’t discuss this in depth before but what makes Bert and Ernie so great, particularly in those years when Jim Henson was still around, wasn’t only Ernie’s ability to drive Bert up a wall but their underlying love for each other, even though that love may not have been as clear or apparent at all times. I’m guessing this was another way that the show deliberately undercut any overly precious or saccharine qualities it otherwise could have had. Classic Sesame Street had a bit of bite to it. You didn’t have to see Ernie and Bert always verbalizing or explaining their friendship to realize there was warmth there underneath the pranks.
Although today many identify Ernie and Bert as a gay couple, the show
Read MoreSesame St S1: Songs, Etc.
After watching a few early episodes of Sesame Street over the past few days, today I’m taking a look at a number of famous clips from throughout the first season, since obviously, watching all of 4,552 currently produced episodes isn’t an option! I got the first group from the “Classic Cuts” bonus feature on the Sesame Street: Old School, Volume 1 DVD set.
The first is of Ernie in the bathtub, singing his signature song, “Rubber Duckie,” his ode to his very favorite, squeakiest bathtime companion. What is wonderful about the song is that, besides being beautifully representative of Ernie’s openhearted, emotive, whimsical nature, it also doesn’t serve an explicitly educational point other than to encourage children to make use of their imaginations and perhaps to encourage them to enjoy bathtime. But, again, it’s so fun that it doesn’t feel like a lesson at all. In fact, like Kermit’s “Bein’ Green,” it gained cultural popularity far beyond that of a typical children’s show song, hitting No. 16 on the Billboard single charts (and not in a children’s category) and even being nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Recording for Children in 1970! And it only lost to another Sesame Street album, The Sesame Street Book & Record, which it was also on, anyway!
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Sesame Street Ep #123
Cookie answers the phone.
Today we come to the final first season of Sesame Street episode I’ll be watching for the site, which you can view on Netflix and iTunes under the title, “Here Comes Cookie Monster”. And, as you might have guessed, I’m not too torn apart at leaving this first season behind. It’s been a fascinating peek at the embryonic stage of what would become a brilliant show, however besides the sketches, which allow us the first glimpses of Sesame Street genius, and some cool first-time moments, the plodding street scenes and lack of narrative cohesion make the experience of watching the overall episodes a bit of a slog.
If nothing else, these handful of episodes provide an unimpeachable argument for why, at least at this stage of the show, watching random
Read MoreThe Muppets 1.07: “Pig’s in a Blackout”
Jason Bateman harangues Kermit.
It’s difficult to say without having seen the rest of the season–particuarly whatever will come after the upcoming hiatus, during which The Muppets is apparently going to be retooled, although to what extent isn’t yet apparent–but I’m very tempted to pronounce that, after a few uneven outings, the show is on an upswing.
Last week’s episode wasn’t the show’s funniest overall but it finally gave Piggy the sort of nuance and depth that she’d been largely missing since the pilot and in so doing infused the proceedings with a great deal of warmth, which many have accused this new Muppet show of lacking. This week’s, however, is even better, as not only is it riotously Muppety–the first time arguably since the pilot or the second episode that the show has
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