Question about The Muppet Movie

[Lara]

We watched The Muppet Movie again tonight and my husband and I have a difference of opinion. A couple of times when watching a scene that seemed hard or impossible for a muppet, he thought somehow special effects or green screens were used. I always thought that Jim Henson made a muppet with the equipment that would allow him to work the muppet they way he needed. The examples tonight were Fozzie and Kermit dancing on the El Sleezo stage and later when Kermit continues to move after the bad guy in overalls picked him up to put him in Professor Krassman's machine. Which is right? I know I read that the muppets riding the bicycle in one of the other movies was not special effects.
Thanks, Lara

 

[CensoredAlso]

The examples tonight were Fozzie and Kermit dancing on the El Sleezo stage

I always thought that looked something like a blue screen effect, like when the Muppet performers would dress in black. Can anyone confirm?

 

[David French]

Blues/green screen is an electronic effect, and in the 1970's it was only ever used in TV studios.

 

[CensoredAlso]

Blues/green screen is an electronic effect, and in the 1970's it was only ever used in TV studios.

Actually The Invisible Man from 1933 pretty much helped pioneer what would become today's blue screen effects.

 

[dwmckim]

We watched The Muppet Movie again tonight and my husband and I have a difference of opinion. A couple of times when watching a scene that seemed hard or impossible for a muppet, he thought somehow special effects or green screens were used. I always thought that Jim Henson made a muppet with the equipment that would allow him to work the muppet they way he needed. The examples tonight were Fozzie and Kermit dancing on the El Sleezo stage and later when Kermit continues to move after the bad guy in overalls picked him up to put him in Professor Krassman's machine. Which is right? I know I read that the muppets riding the bicycle in one of the other movies was not special effects.
Thanks, Lara

Congratulate yourselves as you're BOTH right! A number of different effects are used to get Muppets to do stuff and both of you made good guesses! The Fozzie/Kermit El Sleezo dance is a blue/green screen type effect and Kermit en route to Prof K's machine was radio control.

 

[Pinkflower7783]

I'd rather not know how they did things myself takes away the magic. Yeah I know cheesy but just my opinion.

 

[CensoredAlso]

I'd rather not know how they did things myself takes away the magic. Yeah I know cheesy but just my opinion.

Yeah there's sort of two schools of thought there and both are fine, it depends on your experience. I grew up almost immediately knowing about the behind the scenes stuff so that in a weird way became part of the magic for me, lol. But yeah not everyone is the same.

 

[dwmckim]

I'd rather not know how they did things myself takes away the magic. Yeah I know cheesy but just my opinion.

Just as how some scientists have said that the more they learn about the complexities of how things in nature work, the more it strengthens their belief in a higher power to have created such majesty, i find knowing the "how" behind a scene doesn't take away the magic...because a large portion of the magic is in the skill of the Muppeteers to still pull it off.

Apologies if this is the first time anyone's heard this example and i'm spoiling it (but this is one Jim would often cite so it was hardly a mass secret at the time...plus anyone who's seen Valentine Show and Emmett Otter could more easily "figure it out" - Jim always used to describe in interviews how he was so astonished by how many people were amazed by Kermit riding a bike in Muppet Movie when it was a "simple" marionette. But fact is - even though the concept is simple, the execution still wasn't; not only would that have been a massive height that the puppeteer was operating from, but marionettes aren't the easiest type of Muppets to work and look convincing (Jim himself conceded in the 80s that marionettes was one type of puppet he could never quite fully get the hang of) and to make any of the movie bike sequences look good takes an extraordinary amount of skill (not to mention the hassles of setting up the sequence, relying on the natural outdoors light being just right etc)

 

[Pinkflower7783]

I mean don't get me wrong I'm a realist too...I know their just puppets and their not technically real but there's still that child in me that when I watch Kermit I don't think okay there's someone maniuplating his every moves I think of Kermit as a real living being just like me and you are. Even when I see Jim performing Kermit I don't think Kermit isn't real because he's been brought to life just like an animated character that Disney would've drawn. But that doesn't mean I don't appericate or disrespect any of the muppeteers. If anything that shows how much I do appericate all the hard work that goes into them and what a tremendous job they do because when I watch the muppets or even Fraggle Rock you just see all the life and emotion that they put into these characters and I think that's just amazing to me personally.

 

[Pinkflower7783]

By the way I did read of how they did the bike scenes. Jim was so amazing.