The MuppetCast - Show #72 - Oh, Lou!

[stephenjlizard]

Hello everybodeeeee! It is your old pal The MuppetCast! This week is all about the lost art of conversation, as this episode contains three separate interviews! The first is a new addition to the Profile of a Podcaster series, with my good friend Lou Mongello. Lou is an author, podcaster, and now a publisher, and we talk about his podcast, WDW Radio, and his many other media ventures. He's a great guy, and I think after you hear him on the show you'll definitely want to go out and subscribe to WDW Radio!

Also check out Van on the Netcot podcast! Always good to hear about the Muppets on Disney podcasts, and Van runs an incredible show! Make sure you subscribe and listen to Netcot this and every week.

The second interview brings back another good friend, David Quesal, in a new Muppet List! David is a regular contributor to the show and one subject he's very interested in is Muppet music. My wife Ashley also joins us! We all discuss a list of Muppet musicians, and much fun is had by all.

Finally, Ryan and Joe from Tough Pigs.com join me to discuss the recent decision made by HIT Entertainment to rlease Fraggle Rock: The Complete Series and not a separate 4th season (which would allow those of us who have already spent $90+ already to just complete the collections we've already started). I think it was a good discussion, and it certainly won't be the last time this DVD set is mentioned on the show. UPDATE: If you look at the FR DVD set page on Amazon (click here to view), it already has two 5-star reviews. Really?

Much more to check out over at MuppetCast.com, go vote in the poll after leaving your thoughts on this week's episode. Thanks for listening!

 

[The Count]

Hi Steve... Listened to the show late last night.

Thoughts...
1 Um, I believe the band's name is Chris and the "Alphabeats". From what I understand, "Alpha-Bits" used to be a cereal with shapes made to be the individual letters of the alphabet. They even used to have a saint bernard spokescharacter who would protect the letters from being stolen by this guy who looked like the villain/rogue from the Mr. Magoo literary movies.
2 Interesting to know that Jim was defending Cookie's eating habits way back when. There's a segment I remember where María tried to get Cookie to eat healthier back in the 80's. She introduced him to apples, carrots, and raisins... And when he was finished, he ate the plates too!
3 Leslie's been part of the Muppet troop for a while. Her more famous character before Abby was Spamela from MT, back in the late 90's.
4 Did you get the chance to ask Lou why people give him the "oh, Lou." refrain? Or have you figured that one out by now. My theory, is that it's a thinly-veiled reference to the Mary Tyler Moore Show. Remember, when she would admonish her boss, Lou Grant with an "oh Lou" and a frumious toss of her hair?
5 The Muppet List... Hi Ashley! Spunky little pixy idn't she? Was she thinking of the "It's In Every One Of Us" medley with Scooter and John Denver? And while on the subject of Lips, don't forget his one spoken line in the song "Barnyard Boogie".
6 Couldn't quite hear the bits with Joe and Ryan from ToughPigs. What I'm interested in cause Joe said he did this... How did he sell his previous individual FR season sets? For how much? Personally, I might wait until we get more details as to what exactly the complete set contains in terms of extras. If it comes with the booklets the other three came with, then I'll have no compuncture over buying it and selling my Seasons 1 and 2 sets. Also, there is a campaign here and on Facebook to at least attempt to get a separate Season 4 set released. Oh, and it's not HIT Entertainment who's behind this. Remember, they got bought by Lions Gate earlier this year.
Got nothing else... Just a couple of questions about MC Unplugged and looking forward to the ongoing JHH episode review/recap feature segments.

Thanks and take care.

 

[Dire Corrector]

Hey Steve! I have a couple of comments about the show as well.

Christopher Cerf was also one of the founders of National Lampoon. There's an entertaining discussion between him, and a guy that pretended to be him....to get girls....on This American Life. The link to the episode is below.

http://www.thisamericanlife.org/Radio_Episode.aspx?sched=653

Also about Dr. Teeth, if you look at pictures of Dr. John and his costumes from the 70's, he's pretty clearly one of the inspirations for the characters.

 

[ToughPigsJoe]

The Count: to answer your question, I sold my Fraggle Rock DVDs as a bundle on Amazon.com. But like I said on the podcast, I sold them in that short window of time between when the complete series was announced and when the 4th season was taken off the schedule. If you try to sell yours today, I don't know if the recent news would affect the price or the sellability.

Thanks again, Steve, for a fun interview!

 

[stephenjlizard]

Sorry it's taken me so long to get back here. Good thoughts!

Count:
1. You're right, it's "Alphabeats". Indeed, I used to eat nothing but Alpha-bits cereal for breakfast, and Alphabet soup for lunch as a child, wich is porbably why I spell so wel tody.

2. Mmm, ceramic plates, with just a little salt and pepper. Do I hear "let them eat cake", lol?

3. Interesting. When/If I get to talk to her on the show we'll discuss that!

4. The "Oh, Lou" phrase is a shorter-lived piece in the greater study of Mongellology. Essentially Lou has been so successful in his media efforts, and has become such a celebrity in our community that we pretend to swoon and fawn over him anytime his name is mentioned. It's just fun. A more widely used phrase, and something that's become a universal (oops, the "U" word!) greeting among many in the Disney online community is to simply say "Mongello!"

5. She was thinking of "It's In Every One Of Us", yes. Ashley is actually on MC, I think her username is Jubilee or Jubilee37.

6. I think we need to buy Ryan and Joe separate mics, who's with me? Hehe.


Dire Corrector:
That's really cool, I didn't realize that! I knew his father co-founded Random House, which probably gave him an early education in the publishing biz.

I was aware of the Dr. John influence, I think that's been documented in a few places. Very interesting dude, if you ever see any video of him.

 

[The Count]

Yep... She's JubileePink. And Christopher Cerf's father, according to Muppet Wiki, was one of the original panelists on the game show What's My Line? Which is why he was parrodied in both Anything Muppet and Anything Monster form in two versions of What's My Part? on Sesame as Bennett Snerf.

 

[stephenjlizard]

Connections within connections within connections. Cosmic, baby!

 

[BEAR]

4 Did you get the chance to ask Lou why people give him the "oh, Lou." refrain? Or have you figured that one out by now. My theory, is that it's a thinly-veiled reference to the Mary Tyler Moore Show. Remember, when she would admonish her boss, Lou Grant with an "oh Lou" and a frumious toss of her hair?
:

I thought the same thing, Ed, except the fact that on the Mary Tyler Moore Show, she almost never called Lou Grant by his first name. Always "Mr. Grant". On the Dick Van Dyke Show, Mary Tyler Moore's character was famous for saying "Oh, Rob" though.

Steve, great show! I'll post my thoughts after I've finished listening.

 

[The Count]

Well... Basically, I only know what I posted owing to the sketch on the episode of Saturday Night Live hosted by Ed Asner, where he and a squad of paramilitary troops went in to rescue her from the confines of sitcom-world life, reliving the same tedium day after day. It was a funny bit. Gary Kroeger, one of the troops asks Ed/Lou :is it true what they say? Can she really turn the world on with a smile?"
For further reference, Mary Gross played Mary Tyler and Joe Piscopo played Ted Baxter.

See yas later.

 

[stephenjlizard]

That was a most excellent guess as to the origin of "Oh Lou", Count! Unfortunately many of us are nowhere near as knowledgeable or diligent as you are when crafting witty and funny references. But I'm now putting SNL and Mary Tyler Moore on my Netflix queue, hehe.

I personally like the term "Mongellology", and am quite proud that I would invent such a word