The Storyteller's Performers

[minor muppetz]

in The Terrible Tunnel, The Storyteller Fraggle made her first appearance and was performed by Richard Hunt. After that, she was performed by Terry Angus. Does anybody know why? Was Richard Hunt unavailible for her second appearance and it was decided that The Storyteller was such a minor character that it didn't matter what she sounded like? Did terry angus sound dead-on as the storyteller (I don't know what his version of the voice is like)? Did Richard Hunt dislike performing the storyteller as much as he disliked performing elmo? Does anybody have any answers?

 

[Frags]

I always wondered things like that. There's also one episode where Jerry Nelson doesn't actually perform Gobo - he just does the voice. It's in Space Frog Follies and Rob Mills, apparently, does all the movements, and Jerry just does the voice. I don't know why though.

 

[minor muppetz]

I always wondered things like that. There's also one episode where Jerry Nelson doesn't actually perform Gobo - he just does the voice. It's in Space Frog Follies and Rob Mills, apparently, does all the movements, and Jerry just does the voice. I don't know why though.

It's possible that Jerry Nelson either wasn't availible o perform in that episode or wasn't in any condition to perform. Karen Prell mentioned in her interview on Muppet Central that there was an episode where she only did the voice of red for some reason, I can't remember why (it could be mentioned in the interview), and She also mentioend that there were plans for an episode about wembly planned but was pushed back untill later (or possibly not filemd at all) because Steve Whitmire had his arm hurt, causing red to star in an episode.

 

[minor muppetz]

So, can anybody tell me how different her voice was when Terry Angus took over? Was it really similar (like how Eric jacopsons versions of Frank Oz's characters sound similar) or competely different (like if you compare Jerry Nelsons Statler voice with Richard Hunts)?

 

[BooberFraggless]

The Storyteller's voice played by Terry Angus was rather different from the Storyteller played by Richard Hunt. You could definetly tell the difference in the voice. Terry's was squekier and high pitched. Richard's had more of a Raspy quality to it. I talked to Terry Angus online about this years ago, and I never did ask him why he took over the role of the Storyteller. I guess they just wanted Terry to have some regular charachters since he was a newbie, and since the Storyteller had only been used once before by someone else they figured they could get away with giving him that charachter and nobody would notice. Terry also mentioned to me that he was sick during the episode "Boober's Quiet Day" but he performed the story Teller anyways. She had a brief appearance in this episode for those of you who can remember. He told me you can tell by listening to the Storyteller he I watched this episode not too long after he told me this, and he was right, you really can notice it. But even though his performance wasn't perfect, at least he tried his best.

 

[PukkaPukka]

Terry took over the Storyteller when asked by Jerry Juhl, if I remember correctly. If I'm fudging here, Terry should be able to clarify, but I believe this was the case.

 

[ButchCat]

Hi Everyone,

This letter has been a long time coming and I am sorry for not doing this letter sooner. When I first read these letters here I had just learned of Jerry Juhl’s passing and I was just too upset to respond. Before I go on I want to thank Phil Chapman for letting me know about this post. As PukkaPukka said Jerry Juhl asked me to take on the roll of the Storyteller when Richard was too busy on Sesame Street to fly back to perform her. I ask Jerry how he wanted me to play her and he said to do what ever I wanted. So I tried to keep a bit of Richard into her and made her my own. The second time I played the Storyteller Richard was back and I assumed that Richard would be playing her again. So I went up to Richard and asked if he wanted her back and he told me that he didn’t like playing her and didn’t want to play her. So I continued performing her.

The first episode that I played her was “Boober Rock”. In that script the Storyteller was talking about the caves of boredom and it also had her swooning over Traveling Matt. This was something I really hooked onto and I made her very love sick over Matt that ended up being a running thing. My favorite Storyteller episode was “Born To Wonder” where I got to pay a younger version of her.

Karen Prell and I joked one time that my background Fraggle Morris was the Storyteller’s son. Hey, they both had glasses they where both a Gold/yellow color. So who was the Father??? To continue that joke on the “Change of Address” episode The Storyteller was to appear in the Closing credits with Traveling Matt tripping over himself. It was a very quick scene. I had gotten the Storyteller puppet on and got ready to do the scene when suddenly Karen Prell puts Morris on and had him right beside the Storyteller. You’ll have to more than likely freeze the frame to catch it but the whole family is there. Wait! Does that mean the Traveling Matt is…… Nawww! Can’t be.

Take care everyone

Terry Angus

 

[muppet_dk]

I love to read storys like this, thanks for telling us Terry.

 

[Collgoff]

I always wondered things like that. There's also one episode where Jerry Nelson doesn't actually perform Gobo - he just does the voice. It's in Space Frog Follies and Rob Mills, apparently, does all the movements, and Jerry just does the voice. I don't know why though.

Me nether!

 

[Collgoff]

It's possible that Jerry Nelson either wasn't availible o perform in that episode or wasn't in any condition to perform. Karen Prell mentioned in her interview on Muppet Central that there was an episode where she only did the voice of red for some reason, I can't remember why (it could be mentioned in the interview), and She also mentioend that there were plans for an episode about wembly planned but was pushed back untill later (or possibly not filemd at all) because Steve Whitmire had his arm hurt, causing red to star in an episode.

You kn always wonder how the Wembley episode go; the one it was writen and never filmed because Steve broke a born in hand.