Who owns Tale of The Bunny Picnic and Ghost of Fathner Hall?

[D'Snowth]

DOES Disney own the rights to Bunny Picnic? If they do, I'll probably want to remove my postings of it from YouTube, considering I've already gotten in trouble with them before for posting Grover's appearance on Jimmy Kimmel.

 

[mupcollector1]

Anyone know what the Ed Suvillan Company is now called or who owns Great Santa Claus Switch and the Mr. Willobies Christmas Tree? If I knew, I'll try to contact them about releasing them on DVD. I know I tried Loinsgate for The Jim Henson Hour and they said they wrote down my request and will metnion it in their next meeting. Same thing Disney does when I contact them. Well at least I know the idea for those releases have been heard one way or another and I'm sure a lot of people here have tried contacting DVD departments as well.

It would be nice if Tale of the Bunny Picnic was released on DVD, I really like the music on there, it's very Fraggle Rockish, plus the music is from the two guys that do the music for Fraggle Rock.

 

[muppetperson]

DOES Disney own the rights to Bunny Picnic? If they do, I'll probably want to remove my postings of it from YouTube, considering I've already gotten in trouble with them before for posting Grover's appearance on Jimmy Kimmel.

Huh? Grover is Sesame Workshop.Why
would Disney want it removed? Unless you were joking about character ownership?

 

[D'Snowth]

Because Jimmy Kimmel's show is on ABC, which is owned by Disney.

 

[muppetperson]

From what I know, Tale of the Bunny Picnic is owned by Disney. Ghost of Faffner Hall is owned by JHC. And then to back this, I check Henson's website, which lists most of the productions that they own, and it mentions Faffner Hall but doesn't mention Bunny Picnic, which means that this is probably the case.

Makes sence to me,seeing that the characters in Ghost of Faffner Hall arent built in the Muppet style.They are more rubber looking like Spittin Image.

 

[muppetperson]

Because Jimmy Kimmel's show is on ABC, which is owned by Disney.

Gottcha.Thanks.
Seems to be a lot of cross overs, weaven by different ownerships.

 

[mupcollector1]

Makes sence to me,seeing that the characters in Ghost of Faffner Hall arent built in the Muppet style.They are more rubber looking like Spittin Image.

lol That funny you mention Spitting Image because I've always thought that the Creature Shop was inspired by Spitting Image around the time of Faffner Hall and Mother Goose Stories. There's rumor that Roger Law and Peter Fluck asked Jim Henson to be a part of Spitting Image and Jim turned down the offer because he didn't think charactured humans would be believable on screen or something like that. It's a story that I've read in an article so it's hard to say, though I do believe Jim was asked and he turned down the offer. All I know was Fluck and Law went to one of Jim's lectures around 1983 when them and the early crew were developing Spitting Image basically with no knowledge of puppetry and film making. But what's really interesting is people who worked on The Dark Crystal helped Fluck and Law figure out the eye mechanisms, and Louise Gold of The Muppet Show tranned the puppeteers and was the original Queen, Marty Robinson worked on the show from 1986 and 1990 and some specials in 1986 / 1987 and one of my all time favorite puppeteers got his start on Spits "Anthony Asbury".

I don't mean to keep rambling on about Spitting Image but it's like my 3rd favorite TV show EVER, I'm a HUGE FAN!

Anyway, I love that charactured puppet style. I've rarely seen Faffner Hall (Louise Gold worked on it too ). I've seen short clips of it and the press photos in Jim Henson The Works that I just love! If I may, I just want to post these for a second.

There's another one with a giant weight and a pair of scissors about to cut the rope attached to it, under the character with the mustache. I just wanted to point out that I love pictures like that. It's very comic strip slapstick. lol

But anyway, back to my original reply. Faffner Hall like Mopatop Shop used puppets from The Muppet Show as background characters and since Disney owns The Muppets, I wasn't sure how things are in terms of the rights. Plus I noticed in the more recent Sesame Street episodes, there was a strange usage of Muppet Show Muppets like the White Rabbit from the Brook Shelds Alice and Wonderland episode and the Big Headed Boss from the 90s Muppet Meeting Films dressed as a viking. Little things like that tend to make me cringe because certain characters belong in certain Muppet universes. Although I can certainly say that I didn't mind the Muppet Show Chickens making a cameo in a Sesame segment where it was an animal choir conducted by this guest conductor and it was sung by Richard Hunt's character. I forgot how to spell and pernounce the first name of the character but he was a flamingo who sang opera. One of those sketches. Heck, I remember having a series of nightmares seeing The Muppet Show cast on Sesame Street and thinking "HEY, WAIT A MINUTE!" lol Before I really go off subject lol, Basicly put it I don't mind the Sesame Muppets guest staring in specials, movies and The Muppet Show. In fact I love it, but it just doesn't work the other way around.

One more thing. I just discovered that Faffner Hall was released on iTunes UK by The Jim Henson Company so I guess JHC does own the rights to it, but I wonder if they had to ask permission from Disney due to the Muppet show Muppets. In my personal opinion, only if Jim's creations were all in the same company still, it would be so simple.

 

[muppetperson]

lol That funny you mention Spitting Image because I've always thought that the Creature Shop was inspired by Spitting Image around the time of Faffner Hall and Mother Goose Stories. There's rumor that Roger Law and Peter Fluck asked Jim Henson to be a part of Spitting Image and Jim turned down the offer because he didn't think charactured humans would be believable on screen or something like that. It's a story that I've read in an article so it's hard to say, though I do believe Jim was asked and he turned down the offer. All I know was Fluck and Law went to one of Jim's lectures around 1983 when them and the early crew were developing Spitting Image basically with no knowledge of puppetry and film making. But what's really interesting is people who worked on The Dark Crystal helped Fluck and Law figure out the eye mechanisms, and Louise Gold of The Muppet Show tranned the puppeteers and was the original Queen, Marty Robinson worked on the show from 1986 and 1990 and some specials in 1986 / 1987 and one of my all time favorite puppeteers got his start on Spits "Anthony Asbury".

I don't mean to keep rambling on about Spitting Image but it's like my 3rd favorite TV show EVER, I'm a HUGE FAN!

Anyway, I love that charactured puppet style. I've rarely seen Faffner Hall (Louise Gold worked on it too ). I've seen short clips of it and the press photos in Jim Henson The Works that I just love! If I may, I just want to post these for a second.

There's another one with a giant weight and a pair of scissors about to cut the rope attached to it, under the character with the mustache. I just wanted to point out that I love pictures like that. It's very comic strip slapstick. lol

But anyway, back to my original reply. Faffner Hall like Mopatop Shop used puppets from The Muppet Show as background characters and since Disney owns The Muppets, I wasn't sure how things are in terms of the rights. Plus I noticed in the more recent Sesame Street episodes, there was a strange usage of Muppet Show Muppets like the White Rabbit from the Brook Shelds Alice and Wonderland episode and the Big Headed Boss from the 90s Muppet Meeting Films dressed as a viking. Little things like that tend to make me cringe because certain characters belong in certain Muppet universes. Although I can certainly say that I didn't mind the Muppet Show Chickens making a cameo in a Sesame segment where it was an animal choir conducted by this guest conductor and it was sung by Richard Hunt's character. I forgot how to spell and pernounce the first name of the character but he was a flamingo who sang opera. One of those sketches. Heck, I remember having a series of nightmares seeing The Muppet Show cast on Sesame Street and thinking "HEY, WAIT A MINUTE!" lol Before I really go off subject lol, Basicly put it I don't mind the Sesame Muppets guest staring in specials, movies and The Muppet Show. In fact I love it, but it just doesn't work the other way around.

One more thing. I just discovered that Faffner Hall was released on iTunes UK by The Jim Henson Company so I guess JHC does own the rights to it, but I wonder if they had to ask permission from Disney due to the Muppet show Muppets. In my personal opinion, only if Jim's creations were all in the same company still, it would be so simple.

It is a long time since I have seen Ghost of Faffner Hall, but I dont seem to be able to recall any Muppet show characters in it?

 

[mupcollector1]

It is a long time since I have seen Ghost of Faffner Hall, but I dont seem to be able to recall any Muppet show characters in it?

They are in the background. For example.

http://muppet.wikia.com/wiki/Recycled_Muppets

I probably already mentioned that I don't mind if theres recycled Muppets that were used from Fraggle Rock or another show that end up in the main Muppet universe. However I find it disturbing if it went the other way around.

 

[BobThePizzaBoy]

I dug into the archives of Tough Pigs and found this:

Kenny, an enterprising TP forum member, e-mailed John Spelich, the Vice-President of Corporate Communications at Disney, and asked for details. Here's what Mr Spelich said:

"In this transaction, Disney purchased all titles with Muppet content. This includes from television the three main Muppet series (Muppet Show, Muppets Tonight, Muppet Babies), the Muppet-related segments (but not the Storyteller segments) of The Jim Henson Hour, the Muppet interstitials (Muppet Time / Muppetisms) and the three episodes of Little Muppet Monsters.

"From the movies, the deal included The Muppet Movie and The Great Muppet Caper as well as Muppet Meeting Films and the Henson company's ownership of all other Muppet movies.

"In terms of TV specials and direct-to-video, the transaction included Muppet-Show related titles as well as The Frog Prince, Hey Cinderella, The Muppet Musicians of Bremen, Tale of the Bunny Picnic, and Mr Willowby's Christmas Tree.

"Like you, we're big fans of the Muppets as well, and we're also well aware of the passionate dedication of Muppet fans worldwide. We hope to do right by the fans. Thanks for your interest."