Frequency of Characters' Appearances

[minor muppetz]

Does it seem to you like many supporting/ minor characters who were around in new material for nearly two whole decades (or maybe two and a half decades) were not in very many sketches? It seems like some characters might have only appeared in one new sketch a year, or maybe a few sketches in the characters first year, then maybe one new sketch every few years afterwards?

I keep thinking about such characters. Quite a few characetrs I don't know of too many repeated inserts with off-hand, and many of these characters have sketch listings at Muppet Wiki, which seem to have a limited number of sketches. Of course, some of them might have been more major in street scenes than inserts, which could explain my lack of knowledge of appearances. After all, Mupet Wiki doesn't have pages for every episode, and many pages are taken from CTW Archives materials, which don't list everything about the episodes (so, for example, there could have been a lot of episodes where Sherlock Hemlock or Harvey Kneeslapper or somebody had main plot focus, yet wasn't mentioend in CTW Archive epsidoe descriptions).

It's especialy odd when it seems like characters who I know were on the show for more than one decade, like Sherlock Hemlock and Simon Soundman, seem to have close to the same number of listed segments as characters who I know were only on the show for nealry one or two seasons, like Herbert Birdsfoot and Harvey Kneeslapper (though I think Harvey Kneeslapper might have been on the show for five seasons).

Some characters who were on the show for more than ten years who don't seem to have many known segments include Simon Soundman, The Amazing Mumford, Don Music, Forgetful Jones, Gladys the Cow, Sherlock Hemlock, he Monotones, and Chris and the Alphabeats. With the exceptions of Sherlock Hemlock and The Amazing Mumford, it seems to me like most of those characters rarely appeared in any books as well (though I guess that musical characters might be hard to write for). I know that Mumford, Gladys, and Forgetful Jones were major street characters.

 

[Ziffel]

I think some of these characters were more one purpose type muppets. Like Sherlock Hemlock only appearing in segments solving cases (though he appeared with Bert in a Jon Jon clip that had nothing to do with solving a mystery). And Don Music in his playing the piano and getting frustrated skits. And Mumford doing his tricks on stage, Harvey pulling his pranks, Lefty trying to sell things, and The Monotones performing their songs.

While the major muppets like Ernie, Bert, Grover, Kermit, Oscar, Cookie Monster, Big Bird, The Count, and Herry had far more versatile purposes and appeared on many street scenes too, and with other muppets and humans.

I've always thought it odd that Farley was only used sporadically throughout. He certainly was more of an all purpose muppet. And of course Herbert Birdsfoot, Harvey Kneeslapper, and Roosevelt Franklin were retired fairly early. And Simon Soundman was also similar to Mr. Johnson or Fat Blue. So between the two of them, there was really quite a lot of appearances.

Neat topic here since your user name is minor muppetz.

And also noticed you have almost 6000 posts. What is really impressive to me about that is that your posts are often so lengthy, substantive, and thought out. So to have 6000 posts of the type that you make is really saying something. Good job!

 

[minor muppetz]

And also noticed you have almost 6000 posts. What is really impressive to me about that is that your posts are often so lengthy, substantive, and thought out. So to have 6000 posts of the type that you make is really saying something. Good job!

I noticed this recently as well. I do get a lot of free time to think, even when I am busy. And I did think about these things well long before I joined the message board.

Thinking about it, it seems like Mr. Johnson was more of a minor character in the early years. In the 1970s he would often be seen as Grover's resturaunt customer, and it seems to me like there weren't very many waiter Grover sketches until the 1990s. Mr. Johnson would also be used as a sort of utility character, much like Farley, and would often be performed by other performers besides Jerry Nelson. Then by the early 1990s it would be more common for Mr. Johnson to appear as Grover's customer in a variety of other situations, and the "Grover the Waiter" series seemed to have new segments more frequently, and it also became more common for Mr. Johnson to be Grover's customer at other resturaunts besides Charlie's.

And it seems like most recurring segments didn't have many individual sketches, as if a few debuted in certain years, and then new ones would be produced whenever somebody got an idea for a new sketch, which could be every year, every other year, or every few years. There are at least 37 Monsterpeice Theater sketches, and that series of segments seemed to have newly produced segments for almost 20 years (I don't know the exact debut year, and I also don't know when the last sketch was produced, though I do know that season 33 was the last season to have a Monsterpeice Theater segment). It also seems like most of "The Adventures of Super Grover" sketches were made in the 1970s, with more being made occassionally in the 1980s and 1990s. But Super Grover did apear in sketches outside of "The Adventures of Super Grover", often appearing in skits without the Super Grover title card, sometimes making cameos, and alsobein gheavily featured in street plots.

Before the format change of 2002, I think that Sesame Street News was the only recurring segment to have many new sketches every year. New news segments were made from 1972 (or possibly 1971)-1990, and last I checked at Mupet Wiki there were 80 sketches (though Mupet Wiki does list soem segments with Kermit as a reproter that might not have officially counted as a news sketch, like Kermit's appearance in Miami Mice). Elmo's World started out with 10 segments per season, but at first the same segmnets were shown in every episode of the week (much like Blue's Clues at the time). Eventually, the show started having different segments on each day of the week. I think this change began by the end of the segmnet's first season (I wouldn't be surprised if the change happened after all of the first ten segments were broadcast). After two years of there being ten new segments, the number of Elmo's World segments per year was shortened to 5. When Elmo's World began Sesame Street had 65 episodes a season, and now it's 26.

The letter and number of the day segments also intitially had many sketches in their first season. Being letter an dnumber sketches, there were segmnets for numbers up to 20 (including 0), and all 26 letters of the alphabet (as well as multi-part sketches). I don't know how many Spanish Word of the Day sketches were produced in it's first year, but those other skits had plenty, and then new segments for certain letters and numbers were eventualy produced.

So maybe certain characters were itnroduced with plenty of material, and then the writers started writing for them less, getting around to them when they ad gotten ideas for new sketches. I wonder how the performers felt about not being able to perform certain characters for long periods of time (especially if there was a year or two long gap between production on segments with certain characters).

 

[minor muppetz]

It seems like some characters, like Guy Smiley, Mr. Johnson, Chrissy and the Alphabeats, and Lefty would seem out of place in a street scene, but then again, I also feel that way about The Count and Forgetful Jones, and they were often seen on the street.

Some characters, like Big Bird, Oscar, Slimey, Bruno, Benny, Barkley, Sam the Robot, Biff, Sully, and Snuffy were seen much more frequently on the street than in inserts (though there were inserts that took place on the street). Some characters, like Grover (during the 1970s and more recent years), Elmo, Zoe, Telly, Baby Bear, and The Count, seem to be in an almost even balance of street scenes and inserts. And of course there are many characters who have mostly just been in inserts.

It seems like most musical characters were often limited to appearing in their own musical numbers (especially musicians who were voiced by songwriters as opposed to Muppet performers). One of the few musical characters to nhave been main on the street was Hoots the Owl, and I guess his granddaughter, Athena, and possibly Placedo Flamingo. I'm thinking the same could be said about Don Music, but I'm not too sure. Terry Angus said (in his Muppet Central interview) that in the later years of Fraggle Rock Richard Hunt focused more on Sesame Street, so I would guess that most of his characters were often seen on the street.

But it does seem like most of the main characters had plenty of new segment appearances almost every year. Obviously, after Jim Henson died Ernie rarely appeared in new material (occassionaly appearing in the background, and even more occassionally lip synching to older recordings of earlier songs that Ernie sang) before being recast with a new performer. I think Herbert Birdsfoot would have been in a lot more segments if he wasn't retired early on. I think he was meant to be a main character, thouhg most of his segmnets were him giving a lecture or demosntration, while most of the other main characters often did other things as well. Kermit's role was very similar on Sesame Street at first, but after being brought back he often did a lot more than just lectures, including singing, giving news reports, interacting with kids, and being a victim at his own home. Kermit just barely has more known street appearances than Herbert Birdsfoot. I don't know if Herbert even interracted with any real kids.

As for Sherlock Hemlock, I believe that I once started a thread asking if he was even around in the 1980s (outside of background appearances in outside productions). I think somebody said that he was, but off-hand I only knew of his 1970s sketches and his Mysterious Theater segments from the early 1990s. I've read that he was in new material up until at least 1996, and his old segmnets were shown until at least 1999. If he was retired in 1996 I wonder if he was officially retired, as Jerry Nelson was still a very active performer by that time. He could very easily be used from tiem to time. It's not like i would be ahrd to have more mystery-based episodes, or more problem solving-type episodes. One of the words on the street was mystery. That would have been a great opportunity to have brought him back somehow (though if he wasn't invovled in new material than I guess Sesame Workshop would have most likely just shown a Mysterious Theater segment). It's a shame he wasn't even included in that podcast episode.

I've been doing some counting in my head today, and by my count it seems like Guy Smiley and Mr. Johnson were both in 40 segmnets each, counting background appearances and multi-part segmnets as individual sketches. Also counting segments where the scripts may not have meant specifically for Mr. Johnson to have been used (in at least two of these the puppet doens't have his mustache). That's a lot for less than forty years (and both characetrs weren't on the show every season, and Mr. Johnson seemed to be retired for awhile before being brought back).

And there are characters who seem to make one appearance every season, or every few seasons. Particularly Sinister Sam and Bad Bart. There are also characters who debuted in certain sketches and then made a handful of more appearances, many seasons later, with long gaps between seasons. One of these characetrs is Humpty Dumpty, who first appeared in a newsflash segment in season 6 (or maybe 5), then appeared as the focus of a plot from the early 1990s, and last season made yet anothe rcameo appearance, and this was all the same Humpty Dumpty pupet (though with different performers each time). Another characetr is Cyranose de Bergaric, who debuted in a Monsterpeice Theater segment, then was the focus of a street story, and recently made a cameo in an Elmo's World segment about noses.

 

[ryhoyarbie]

Although I hate to mention him, take a look at Elmo. He appeared in a lot of sketches as a whatever monster in the background. but it wasn't until a man named Kevin Clash took over for the character and started to use the character. The character caught on like a burning fire and surprise, Elmo is now where he is today.

 

[wiley207]

I've noticed in the 1972-1973 season, Count von Count made a LOT of appearances. I guess since this was his debut season, the writers decided to get him in as many material as possible. He appeared in a few brick-wall skits, a couple of castle skits, a Muppet-Kid moment, a Sesame Street News skit, and more! Kinda reminds me of what they did with Abby Cadabby last season. Today, the Count is still a main character and even though he did not make as many new appearances this season, they reran a lot of his previous segments. This will also probably happen with Abby Cadabby in the near future, but then again, she's performed by a newcomer Muppeteer and not a veteran like Jerry Nelson. But both characters would probably never surpass Elmo in popularity.

And for those wondering, trying not to change it into an Elmo-bashing thread, I GREW UP watching Kevin Clash's Elmo on "Sesame Street," and this was the 1990-1993 years, back when he was tolerable. I even liked him then. Today he sometimes annoys me, and sometimes he can make me laugh.