Rare "Cracks" animation from 1970's Sesame Street

[minor muppetz]

I had no idea the program guides actually separated 15-minute parts of the show and referred to the minutes. I also didn't realize they listed the minutes of individual segments. I'd expect that on a private CTW document (one not meant to be released to the public) but not a program guide sent to parents.

I knew that the guides varried from listing many segments ro just listing a few and, I think in some cases, just listing one segment.

 

[minor muppetz]

Regarding them not being allowed to release this, I wonder if it's just to fans or commercially altogether. Maybe the animator is one of those who is hard to negotiate with (do we know what other animated inserts he's done for the show?). I don't know what the deal was with that one fan who managed to purchase five clips from the company, it's possible the person who arranged it no longer works there and maybe went against policy. I know many companies have policies of not selling individual copies of their episodes.

I don't know if Sesame Workshop keeps master tapes of segments separately from the master copies of episodes they were in, but I wonder, if they do, if maybe certain segments are no longer in their archives/vaults/whatever, outside of the episodes they were part of. For example, the Buddy and Jim/Larry and Phyllis/Wally and Ralph segments we have are from episodes that have been available to see in the past decade, none of which were put on compilations, bonus clips, or sesamestreet.org. But then again, 40 Years of Sunny Days and sesamestreet.org do have clips of street scenes, so if there are clips that Sesame Workshop only has as part of master copies of full episodes they could pull them from those episodes.

 

[dycaite]

do we know what other animated inserts he's done for the show?

Crack Master was the only short he ever did for Sesame Street.

 

[Drtooth]

Something tells me there's a reason for that, and maybe that's a reason why this segment is lost. Wouldn't it be just awful if they released this episode on some platform, and that segment wasn't on it for that reason?

 

[dycaite]

I just received a reply back from Cosmo Anzilotti, you can read the whole thing at lostmedia.wikia.com

tl;dr: Cosmo Anzilotti is not the creator of Crack Master, nor did he work on it (at least not to his recollection)... An interesting development indeed.

 

[Walter]

I have heard about this short before... Was it really so scary that it had been locked up after it aired?

 

[Drtooth]

I can't believe that was so scary it had to be completely recalled when they managed to put this on a few times.

Or this...

 

[dycaite]

I am now seeking more info on the short, such as its *real* creator; anyone who can provide me with such info (to lostmediawiki@gmail.com) will go into a draw to win my sealed VHS "The Rescuers" (the rare re-called one with nudity). Thanks to anyone who can help.

 

[muppet maniac]

Remember when Sesame Workshop put up a social media campaign trying to find the actor who played Gordon in the Sesame Street test shows a few years ago? Maybe we can convince them to do the same thing with this.

 

[minor muppetz]

It's interesting what stuff Sesame Workshop took off the show years ago and, in recent years, has released to the public again, whether in Noggin reruns, iTunes episodes, sesamestreet.org, or DVD releases. Though in the case of full episode releases, it seems like Sesame Workshop has only removed segments because of certain legalities (like music writes or animators they'd have to pay, though there are some things removed that are a mystery).

They've taken off the Baker films, Roosevelt Franklin, and Don Music for specific reasons, but have released those segments in recent years, whether in Noggin reruns (though I hear Don Music wasn't in any Sesame Street Unpaved episodes), video releases, or sesamestreet.org. Actually all of those have been released as part of all those media formats in recent years. But then there's the long-unaired I Want a Monster to Be My Friend, which Sesame Workshop hasn't made available in years (wait a minute, I think it might be downloadable as part of the iTunes releases of Monsters! and Born to Add).

I wouldn't be surprised if Crack Master was in any of the episodes chosen for Noggin to air and got cut, but we have no way of knowing. Noggin did cut a number of inserts that don't appear in other episodes on the channel, including scenes related to the street plot and at least two segments with the adults riding bikes on location. Those segments are great and seem harmless, and I've wondered why those were cut, but last night it suddenly hit me that maybe Noggin cut them because the adults didn't wear helmets.