New and very interesting post from Steve Whitmire

[FanOfOneTimers]

https://web.archive.org/web/20260109125606/https://stevewhitmire.website/staging/5480/?p=5857
Since the original post was taken down for “repairs“ I’ll post the internet archive link. To be honest there’s a lot to unpack in this blog post and this fourm is very passionate about this subject matter……

 

[Grumpo]

One thing i wanted to highlight -- in a very sorrowful and honest post about Muppet characters being far bigger than just the "roles" to play, Steve says something about Kermit personality that rings very true to me -- something i had problems finding the words before, things i cannot disagree with:

SW: With a definitive soul like Kermit, you know him when you’re with him just as you’d know a parent, your spouse, or a close friend... If someone walks into the room wearing your best friend’s favorite shirt and talking in their general register with their accent you will still instantly know that person is not who you have come to know.

...It’s either Kermit or it isn’t. At a point when the audience is debating versions of Kermit, there is no longer Kermit to debate.

[Kermit is]...far greater than a voice... everything of Jim that he put into Kermit – his thought processes and timing, certain southernisms and expressions, quirks and affectations, historical references and contextual background, that slight indignant inquisitiveness, his general outlook and life philosophy, that old-fashioned understated and uneasy equanimity when things are going very wrong while still accepting it for what it is...

This echoes what Frank Oz keeps saying about "character purity" and "going back to who they are".

Granted, both of them might be obsessed about authenticity of characters much more than current management, or even many devout fans these days. But that just as well might have been the main reason for Muppets longevity and the extraordinary sympathy people have for the characters for such a long time.

 

[antsamthompson9]

I know Steve had no intent on insulting any of his former co-performers, but there are people out there who are gonna interpret it that way. Tyler Bunch sadly is one of those people, as I saw on Facebook. So is someone who interviewed Steve as you can see here:

 

[Grumpo]

So is someone who interviewed Steve as you can see here

Clearly Cameron Garrity slash "Team Kermit" is not as much obsessed with character authenticity as Steve and Frank.
Somebody posted very good argument right under his video on Youtube -- it is kinda long but has valid points:

Fans continue to complain NOT out of toxicity, negativity or spite, it's because we deeply CARE about the characters and feel we shouldn't settle for less than what this character deserves.

Please click thru to "Watch it on Youtube" above if you care to read it in full.


To follow up with a longish post of my own =)

For now, Steve has removed his post from public space -- either because the original formatting on the website cut off half of the lines when he first posted it, or because he is going to amend or expand the post -- not sure if we should discuss it as such, before he makes it public again. All the rest of the matter has been discussed over and over for the past 10 years, and sums up as follows:

The whole reason is that us, Muppets viewers, are spoiled customers, overindulged and pampered by the sheer ability of Muppeteers to pick up the characters with such talent and skill that the change in character traits and behavior after recast is negligible, or at least fully tolerable, and the joy of "recognition" of the character as we would recognize an old friend is preserved. We've been entertained by Jim Henson and his original TMS team, and we expect that the joy continues unaltered -- or, rather, that changes go by in gradual "evolutionary" small steps fashion. The changes bigger than that can throw us off, and many of us start complaining and making all sorts of "These are not the Muppets i know" comments.

Now, from the recasts of colorful "archetype" characters with a few definite traits, that the rest of the Muppets are, it eventually came to the character with unique, full-fledged personality given to him by Jim, who is a zillion times harder to "emulate" for a new performer smoothly (as opposed to "doing a fresh take" on the old role, or "making the character your own").

Like I sad before, it's not Matt's fault or his lack of ability - he does a perfect job with other characters, and his puppeteering and even his tonality for Kermit are actually pretty close. It is sheer enormity of the task of reconstructing the full "personality" of what Jim put into Kermit. (Even at that, i half suspect that somebody actually told Matt to keep his Kermit different from Steve's, which might account for most of the differences, maybe?)

So, the "character jump", the discontinuity related to new performer is bigger than usual. My own feeling (to put it in much simplified form, now that i have words for it) is that instead of very special "inquisitive Southern gentleman Kermit" we got a "honest hard-working Midwest manager Kermit" -- though with the same appearance and a very similar voice. Both are decent, masterfully performed characters with their own charm. But there IS a personality difference.

Hence, the argument ensues.

The Fans are divided into two sides as follows:

• First side feels that Kermit is no longer the one they used to know, and the issue should be fixed somehow. They feel that since Kermit is also making public appearances as himself: events, TED talks and whatnot, he must be bigger than just the "role" (e.g. "Ladies and Gentlemen, today for the first time Othello will be played by The Great Gonzo!" is OK, "The Great Gonzo played by Othello" not so much), and that not having "real", recognizable and consistent Kermit on stage can lead to collapse -- as it is hindering Muppets popularity and jeopardizing their future. Fans in this camp offer the solutions of their choice: adjust vocal pitch, recast, restore.
  
  
• Second side ardently wishes that the first one would stop complaining about new Kermit and stop putting spokes into Muppets wheel -- as it is hindering Muppets popularity and jeopardizing their future. Fans in this camp offer the arguments of their choice: previous Kermit had same issues; we actually can believe it's the same Kermit if we really try; or maybe we cannot but the change is for the good; Steve was so unspeakable that everybody should be glad of the change anyway; etc. (all of these are matters of opinion without much solid proof, at least per my own research and experience).

Myself, i can understand both positions and sympathize with both sides -- with the provision that the biggest spoke, which came close to overturning the cart -- and started the whole thing of hindering Muppets popularity and jeopardizing their future, was put into their wheel by Mr J.P. Grosse himself, the fact largely forgotten by either party. Plus, personally, i do love the Muppets i grew up with, and wish they could all remain recognizable as such, or close, as long as possible, so i could keep finding joy in their presence. (Purely personal opinion, again -- but it may be shared by a lot of viewers. My personal dream is to see both Steve and Frank involved in Muppet projects again, even if it's only as "creative consultants". )

Steve, not without reason, thinks that the best way to restore Muppets to their own is to let him perform Kermit while he still is able to, and not let all the hard work he had masterfully done restoring Kermit personality by crumbs from his knowledge, his background, and his experiences working with Jim, go to waste.

Matt (this is a pure guess on my part) had probably been told to ignore critics and "make Kermit his own". I think he is far too talented not to feel there is a difference, but likely considers it to be for the better for Kermit.

The Studios (again, pure conjecture based on recent recasts) is (i'm afraid) still not over whatever bone it had to pick with Steve ten years ago, and in case of viewers backlash it might just wait for 10 years more, for the fans who remember "their" Kermit to die off, and/or stop complaining. Meanwhile, they are probably making some small but stable money from all those extra graduation ceremonies they keep sending Matt to, as well.

But all the parties above (except, of course, Disney), though devotedly vocal and/or insistent, do not decide the Muppets fate, at least not directly by this argument. It will be decided on Feb 4 or around, by viewers with Disney+/ABC subscription, with their fingers on their remotes. Their "meh" or "wow" will be defined by the quality of the production, and will make all the difference in the world -- for Muppets popularity and their future. We'll see.

There is not long to wait.

 

[Muppet Master]

Kermit's role in "Muppets Haunted Mansion" was limited & he was completely out of the picture in "The Muppets Mayhem". What that signals to me is that Disney is aware that the performance as of yet is not up to par.

I wish the compromise was be to have Steve back but let Matt (or someone else) work as his understudy for Kermit. But I'm well aware the chances of Steve ever returning are slim. And it would be a dream if Frank could perform his Muppet Show characters one last time, but I acknowledge the chances of that are unlikely.

 

[antsamthompson9]

Mathew Gaydos: I feel like the elephant in the room is that not everyone in the world of Muppets is extremely excited about the new Muppet Show. Some people have gone on to proclaim very publicly that they will not be enjoying it and they are no longer a fan of the Muppets. And some of those people are even former performers of said Muppets. What we're talking about, if somehow I do think there are people who listen to this podcast who don't know what I'm talking about who are less in the Muppet fandom, Steve Whitmire, former performer of Kermit who was relieved of his duties in 2017, put out a huge statement on his website basically saying the Muppets are lost, they cannot be reclaimed under this Disney umbrella and a lot of his gripes, I guess I'll say, fall into this realm of "no Muppet should ever be recast and should essentially die with the original performer, whether they retire or actually die". And as a second generation performer of Kermit the Frog, that's very interesting. But he does cover that by basically saying that that's true for everyone but him.
Jarrod Fairclough: Oh my ***! I'm just gonna start with the phrase, "Oh my ***." I woke up to this information. This had come out at like 1:00 a.m. my time. And I woke up to several messages from several people. The last time that happened was when Caroll Spinney passed away. So I thought, "What the h***'s happened?" And then yes, I read this thing and laughed, but not laughed as in, "Oh, this is funny. What a silly man." I laughed as in, "This is a real thing he thought was okay to put out." I'm just going to quote my favorite part at the end. "I served with Kermit. I know Kermit. Kermit was a friend of mine. Folks, that green frog puppet is no Kermit. His heart and soul are here with me." What self aggrandizing bull****! Disrespectful to every single puppeteer that has basically ever worked with the Muppets past and present. Incredibly disrespectful to Matt, incredibly disrespectful to the people at Muppet Studio, which mind you, he doesn't know any of them because they're all people who have turned up since he left. And disrespectful to the fans. He's basically almost saying that like, hey, if you're a fan of the current Muppets, you know, you shouldn't be or whatever it might be.
Mathew: Or you're not really a fan of the real Muppets, because how could you possibly be a fan of these Muppets and the Muppets we all know and love from the 70s?
Jarrod: Correct. And it's so contradictory in his messaging, so contradictory in the whole "the Muppets should die with the original performer, except for Kermit the Frog because that was me". Notice that he doesn't say anything about the Muppet Newsman, or even like, I thought maybe something about Bean or Rizzo.
Mathew: No mention of Bean or Rizzo was interesting to me as two characters that he did originate and have very recently been publicly recast. I was surprised how Kermit focused this was which makes it feel even more of an attack on Matt Vogel. You know, he tries to cover that off by saying "no disrespect to Matt" in the statement, but obviously then when there's eight paragraphs to follow that, it doesn't feel quite like that is true.
Jarrod: Well, I just looked, Matt's name is in it once the entire time. So, yeah, but it definitely feels like a dig at him in some way.
Matthew: Yeah. And I think it does just feel so, you know, self-centered because I've seen clips of Frank Oz saying not that dissimilar of things, of his feelings about the Muppets currently and the last, you know, decade of the Muppets and how they are under Disney and sort of how he feels. Some of that magic is gone and some of it is gone forever because you can't recapture that magic of him and Jim. He does not make it about himself and say that like "Eric Jacobson replacing me was a mistake." He's just talking about, you know, "there was this lightning in a bottle sensation to the Muppets that I don't think you could ever recapture", which is not, you know, a harmful statement to put out there.
Jarrod: On the contrary, when Frank has spoken about his feelings about the current Muppets, he is still very complimentary of the puppeteers, he's very complimentary of Eric. He has only nice things to say about Eric.
Matthew: And I think when he talks to you and Joe, I think maybe it was that conversation, maybe it was another podcast he did around the same time, I feel like he had said something along the lines of he would be happy to direct or work with the Muppets, but nobody has called him. Like they never asked him to come do that, but he would be interested in doing so. So, it's not that he has this disdain for Disney and the Muppets.
Jarrod: So, I know that Frank has, again, as I said before, a lot of people at Muppet Studio who were there when the whole Steve, you know, as Joe and I referred to it as the Kerfuffle occurred. Those people are now gone and I believe a lot of those people had no interest in any sort of dynamic with Frank. I don't know what it's like now, but I do know that Frank has an open dialogue with the people at Muppet Studio now. I think that's more just a, "hey, let's just be friends". I don't know that they're necessarily interested in bringing him in for anything, but I don't think they're at a point where they're specifically saying they don't want that. What they don't want is something like this statement that Steve made, which was defamatory and just all round bonkers.
Sam Schultz: Yeah. And I mean, I think a lot of what you're talking about is also just like inner office and creative politics that what's the point of even...? To a certain extent, like there's obviously things that if they happened you should bring them to light, but like this kind of thing where you're just complaining to complain, is like yeah, it's self-centered and like take a step back and think like "who could this possibly be helping? It's not going to mean that I'm going to get my job back. It's just going to mean that a bunch of people are p****d." And yeah, what's the point of even talking about any of this stuff not behind closed doors?
Jarrod: Well, I do wonder what his endgame is. Like what is he hoping happens with all this? Like it seems to me, like he's almost saying "if you want the Muppets back, you need me back." But yeah, writing something like this, like they were never going to hire him back anyway, but writing something like this is not the way to get your message across. And it baffles me that he ever thought this was the appropriate thing to do.
Mathew: Also one, it's very long, but I don't feel like he read through it twice or anybody else read through it for him. Because there are direct contradictions multiple times throughout it where he talks about the new Muppet Show and he sort of calls it a cash grab and he says that Disney wants you to forget that these aren't your Muppets that you love because you're going to be blinded by the nostalgia of the Muppet Show, the thing you love, and they're hoping you forget that everyone's different now. Whereas, I don't know, maybe three paragraphs away from that, he talks about how in 2010 he apparently pitched an idea to reboot The Muppet Show because he thought it would be a good idea to help the newer performers get comfortable in a familiar setting that the Muppets would already be used to. And I'm like, "you're saying the same thing in two very different voices here. It's just that this one doesn't involve you." And it's so wild, like you said earlier, that he thought this was a good idea to say publicly and offering no solutions or positivity. It is just complaining for like 12 paragraphs and then not saying "here's what I think we should do as fans or here's what I think would actually make the Muppets better". He's not even offering a counternarrative. He's just saying "here's all of the reasons I think it sucks".
Jarrod: And I mean, look, you know, it has been taken down as of recording, it's no longer up on his website. But there are ways you can see it. I think someone on Reddit has on the Muppet subreddit copied and pasted the entire thing, so you can go read it there. But I mean, you know, if you haven't read it, basically quite early in, he starts talking about cover bands. And he says here "Alan Haney became known as being the original Elvis impersonator, again performing the songs and impersonating the voice." Yep. Correct. That is absolutely correct. Do you know who else did that for about 25 years after someone passed away? You, Steve Whitmire. You did that. And he doesn't seem to understand the complete contradiction of what he's saying. And so that's basically, if you're not going to go and read it, just know that it starts like that and it doesn't get better.
Matthew: And there are points I think throughout that I've seen a lot of people say he has nuggets of wisdom sprinkled in that if you're skimming it, you might be like, "well, what did he say that was so wrong"? Because he has things in there that other Muppet fans have said or like have thought or might agree with of like, "oh yeah, certain projects didn't feel right or certain things maybe need some work". But it's not just that he's worried about the Muppets or that he's thinking there's something they need to be specifically doing. It is so focused on him and at the same time somehow this idea that you cannot replace puppeteers who originate roles and it never reckons with the fact that he is one of those people and doesn't even have a "yeah look, I know I'm saying this as someone who is one of these people". He kind of gets around that. He thinks he's getting around that by saying that he can essentially channel the soul of Jim Henson because he knew the man, which is a paragraph where when it started it starts talking about he'll say like "fans online will talk about someone's supposed to be channeling the spirit of Jim Henson to play this role", which I have seen people say about Matt Vogel, that like, what he's doing isn't an impression, but he's channeling Jim. And so I thought this was the paragraph reads as Steve Whitmire calling out people using that language. And I'm like, "yeah, okay, that's a fair thing. It's kind of weird to say he's channeling Jim". But what it actually ends up being is Steve Whitmire saying "that's Poppycock. He can't channel Jim. He didn't know him. I could channel Jim because I knew him". And I'm like, "oh, okay. Nope. I almost could go with you for a second there and you lost me cuz this is only about you."
Sam: Yeah. It sucks. It's the same kind of thing that makes it not fun to like Star Wars and stuff, except for that it's some, it's like if... Well, I guess Mark Hamill, I don't really actually know what Mark Hamill ever said, but it's like coming out and saying "this movie I was just in sucked" which I guess did kind of happen and was extremely unfun when it happened.
Mathew: Well, and he didn't even say it sucked. He just like disagreed with some creative direction, but as he later said, he was like, "But ultimately, I was convinced... also, I'm an actor. I'm going to do my job. So, I don't think Rian Johnson ruined Star Wars".
Sam: It's just the treating everything like a sacred cow, but also at the same time, it's just the fan thing of like "this is what I want it to be and if it's not, it sucks".
Matthew: Yeah. Which does happen in the Muppet fandom. Like, there's a lot of people who sound like Steve Whitmire on the internet.
Sam: And it also sucks that this argument has been going on for like a decade or whatever and now all over again we have to keep hearing about it.
Jarrod: I think as well, Steve has, like he left and you know, did his own narrative on what happened and again none of us really know the full scope of everything that happened. Like, you know, you always see the, you know, Disney said one thing, Steve said another. The truth is somewhere in the middle. But, you know, Steve came out and then a bunch of people threw their support behind him. And then for 10 years, he's been going to ComicCons and like conventions and all this sort of stuff and has been meeting people who are just telling him for 10 years, "man, you were great. Man, I wish you were Kermit the Frog again". All this sort of thing. So, he seems to have just, I think, there's this echo chamber around him and his ego has just grown out of control and this is what's come out. And I don't think this is it. I think we will see more over the next few weeks. As he thinks, "oh well, you know, that did well. I'm going to say some more stuff". And I truly just don't know what's going to make him go away. I don't think he ever will go away, but I mean, you know, not to speak for anyone, but I saw some people who, you know, have been Steve fans who saw this and went, "Oh, that was a bit much, mate. Maybe pull back on that a little bit." So, maybe that's why he took it down. I don't know.
Mathew: Yeah, maybe some of them who maybe have his ear a little bit more, maybe they mentioned something to him or, you know, that's a best case scenario. Maybe he decided against having it out there in the public and he, you know, won't double down or rile people up even more. We can hope. But as of the recording of this podcast right now the post is down. The Instagram post that was originally linking to it is still up but I don't think he has said anything else other than the website was having some issues. So we shall see how this plays out.

 

[FanOfOneTimers]

Mathew Gaydos: I feel like the elephant in the room is that not everyone in the world of Muppets is extremely excited about the new Muppet Show. Some people have gone on to proclaim very publicly that they will not be enjoying it and they are no longer a fan of the Muppets. And some of those people are even former performers of said Muppets. What we're talking about, if somehow I do think there are people who listen to this podcast who don't know what I'm talking about who are less in the Muppet fandom, Steve Whitmire, former performer of Kermit who was relieved of his duties in 2017, put out a huge statement on his website basically saying the Muppets are lost, they cannot be reclaimed under this Disney umbrella and a lot of his gripes, I guess I'll say, fall into this realm of "no Muppet should ever be recast and should essentially die with the original performer, whether they retire or actually die". And as a second generation performer of Kermit the Frog, that's very interesting. But he does cover that by basically saying that that's true for everyone but him.
Jarrod Fairclough: Oh my ***! I'm just gonna start with the phrase, "Oh my ***." I woke up to this information. This had come out at like 1:00 a.m. my time. And I woke up to several messages from several people. The last time that happened was when Caroll Spinney passed away. So I thought, "What the h***'s happened?" And then yes, I read this thing and laughed, but not laughed as in, "Oh, this is funny. What a silly man." I laughed as in, "This is a real thing he thought was okay to put out." I'm just going to quote my favorite part at the end. "I served with Kermit. I know Kermit. Kermit was a friend of mine. Folks, that green frog puppet is no Kermit. His heart and soul are here with me." What self aggrandizing bull****! Disrespectful to every single puppeteer that has basically ever worked with the Muppets past and present. Incredibly disrespectful to Matt, incredibly disrespectful to the people at Muppet Studio, which mind you, he doesn't know any of them because they're all people who have turned up since he left. And disrespectful to the fans. He's basically almost saying that like, hey, if you're a fan of the current Muppets, you know, you shouldn't be or whatever it might be.
Mathew: Or you're not really a fan of the real Muppets, because how could you possibly be a fan of these Muppets and the Muppets we all know and love from the 70s?
Jarrod: Correct. And it's so contradictory in his messaging, so contradictory in the whole "the Muppets should die with the original performer, except for Kermit the Frog because that was me". Notice that he doesn't say anything about the Muppet Newsman, or even like, I thought maybe something about Bean or Rizzo.
Mathew: No mention of Bean or Rizzo was interesting to me as two characters that he did originate and have very recently been publicly recast. I was surprised how Kermit focused this was which makes it feel even more of an attack on Matt Vogel. You know, he tries to cover that off by saying "no disrespect to Matt" in the statement, but obviously then when there's eight paragraphs to follow that, it doesn't feel quite like that is true.
Jarrod: Well, I just looked, Matt's name is in it once the entire time. So, yeah, but it definitely feels like a dig at him in some way.
Matthew: Yeah. And I think it does just feel so, you know, self-centered because I've seen clips of Frank Oz saying not that dissimilar of things, of his feelings about the Muppets currently and the last, you know, decade of the Muppets and how they are under Disney and sort of how he feels. Some of that magic is gone and some of it is gone forever because you can't recapture that magic of him and Jim. He does not make it about himself and say that like "Eric Jacobson replacing me was a mistake." He's just talking about, you know, "there was this lightning in a bottle sensation to the Muppets that I don't think you could ever recapture", which is not, you know, a harmful statement to put out there.
Jarrod: On the contrary, when Frank has spoken about his feelings about the current Muppets, he is still very complimentary of the puppeteers, he's very complimentary of Eric. He has only nice things to say about Eric.
Matthew: And I think when he talks to you and Joe, I think maybe it was that conversation, maybe it was another podcast he did around the same time, I feel like he had said something along the lines of he would be happy to direct or work with the Muppets, but nobody has called him. Like they never asked him to come do that, but he would be interested in doing so. So, it's not that he has this disdain for Disney and the Muppets.
Jarrod: So, I know that Frank has, again, as I said before, a lot of people at Muppet Studio who were there when the whole Steve, you know, as Joe and I referred to it as the Kerfuffle occurred. Those people are now gone and I believe a lot of those people had no interest in any sort of dynamic with Frank. I don't know what it's like now, but I do know that Frank has an open dialogue with the people at Muppet Studio now. I think that's more just a, "hey, let's just be friends". I don't know that they're necessarily interested in bringing him in for anything, but I don't think they're at a point where they're specifically saying they don't want that. What they don't want is something like this statement that Steve made, which was defamatory and just all round bonkers.
Sam Schultz: Yeah. And I mean, I think a lot of what you're talking about is also just like inner office and creative politics that what's the point of even...? To a certain extent, like there's obviously things that if they happened you should bring them to light, but like this kind of thing where you're just complaining to complain, is like yeah, it's self-centered and like take a step back and think like "who could this possibly be helping? It's not going to mean that I'm going to get my job back. It's just going to mean that a bunch of people are p****d." And yeah, what's the point of even talking about any of this stuff not behind closed doors?
Jarrod: Well, I do wonder what his endgame is. Like what is he hoping happens with all this? Like it seems to me, like he's almost saying "if you want the Muppets back, you need me back." But yeah, writing something like this, like they were never going to hire him back anyway, but writing something like this is not the way to get your message across. And it baffles me that he ever thought this was the appropriate thing to do.
Mathew: Also one, it's very long, but I don't feel like he read through it twice or anybody else read through it for him. Because there are direct contradictions multiple times throughout it where he talks about the new Muppet Show and he sort of calls it a cash grab and he says that Disney wants you to forget that these aren't your Muppets that you love because you're going to be blinded by the nostalgia of the Muppet Show, the thing you love, and they're hoping you forget that everyone's different now. Whereas, I don't know, maybe three paragraphs away from that, he talks about how in 2010 he apparently pitched an idea to reboot The Muppet Show because he thought it would be a good idea to help the newer performers get comfortable in a familiar setting that the Muppets would already be used to. And I'm like, "you're saying the same thing in two very different voices here. It's just that this one doesn't involve you." And it's so wild, like you said earlier, that he thought this was a good idea to say publicly and offering no solutions or positivity. It is just complaining for like 12 paragraphs and then not saying "here's what I think we should do as fans or here's what I think would actually make the Muppets better". He's not even offering a counternarrative. He's just saying "here's all of the reasons I think it sucks".
Jarrod: And I mean, look, you know, it has been taken down as of recording, it's no longer up on his website. But there are ways you can see it. I think someone on Reddit has on the Muppet subreddit copied and pasted the entire thing, so you can go read it there. But I mean, you know, if you haven't read it, basically quite early in, he starts talking about cover bands. And he says here "Alan Haney became known as being the original Elvis impersonator, again performing the songs and impersonating the voice." Yep. Correct. That is absolutely correct. Do you know who else did that for about 25 years after someone passed away? You, Steve Whitmire. You did that. And he doesn't seem to understand the complete contradiction of what he's saying. And so that's basically, if you're not going to go and read it, just know that it starts like that and it doesn't get better.
Matthew: And there are points I think throughout that I've seen a lot of people say he has nuggets of wisdom sprinkled in that if you're skimming it, you might be like, "well, what did he say that was so wrong"? Because he has things in there that other Muppet fans have said or like have thought or might agree with of like, "oh yeah, certain projects didn't feel right or certain things maybe need some work". But it's not just that he's worried about the Muppets or that he's thinking there's something they need to be specifically doing. It is so focused on him and at the same time somehow this idea that you cannot replace puppeteers who originate roles and it never reckons with the fact that he is one of those people and doesn't even have a "yeah look, I know I'm saying this as someone who is one of these people". He kind of gets around that. He thinks he's getting around that by saying that he can essentially channel the soul of Jim Henson because he knew the man, which is a paragraph where when it started it starts talking about he'll say like "fans online will talk about someone's supposed to be channeling the spirit of Jim Henson to play this role", which I have seen people say about Matt Vogel, that like, what he's doing isn't an impression, but he's channeling Jim. And so I thought this was the paragraph reads as Steve Whitmire calling out people using that language. And I'm like, "yeah, okay, that's a fair thing. It's kind of weird to say he's channeling Jim". But what it actually ends up being is Steve Whitmire saying "that's Poppycock. He can't channel Jim. He didn't know him. I could channel Jim because I knew him". And I'm like, "oh, okay. Nope. I almost could go with you for a second there and you lost me cuz this is only about you."
Sam: Yeah. It sucks. It's the same kind of thing that makes it not fun to like Star Wars and stuff, except for that it's some, it's like if... Well, I guess Mark Hamill, I don't really actually know what Mark Hamill ever said, but it's like coming out and saying "this movie I was just in sucked" which I guess did kind of happen and was extremely unfun when it happened.
Mathew: Well, and he didn't even say it sucked. He just like disagreed with some creative direction, but as he later said, he was like, "But ultimately, I was convinced... also, I'm an actor. I'm going to do my job. So, I don't think Rian Johnson ruined Star Wars".
Sam: It's just the treating everything like a sacred cow, but also at the same time, it's just the fan thing of like "this is what I want it to be and if it's not, it sucks".
Matthew: Yeah. Which does happen in the Muppet fandom. Like, there's a lot of people who sound like Steve Whitmire on the internet.
Sam: And it also sucks that this argument has been going on for like a decade or whatever and now all over again we have to keep hearing about it.
Jarrod: I think as well, Steve has, like he left and you know, did his own narrative on what happened and again none of us really know the full scope of everything that happened. Like, you know, you always see the, you know, Disney said one thing, Steve said another. The truth is somewhere in the middle. But, you know, Steve came out and then a bunch of people threw their support behind him. And then for 10 years, he's been going to ComicCons and like conventions and all this sort of stuff and has been meeting people who are just telling him for 10 years, "man, you were great. Man, I wish you were Kermit the Frog again". All this sort of thing. So, he seems to have just, I think, there's this echo chamber around him and his ego has just grown out of control and this is what's come out. And I don't think this is it. I think we will see more over the next few weeks. As he thinks, "oh well, you know, that did well. I'm going to say some more stuff". And I truly just don't know what's going to make him go away. I don't think he ever will go away, but I mean, you know, not to speak for anyone, but I saw some people who, you know, have been Steve fans who saw this and went, "Oh, that was a bit much, mate. Maybe pull back on that a little bit." So, maybe that's why he took it down. I don't know.
Mathew: Yeah, maybe some of them who maybe have his ear a little bit more, maybe they mentioned something to him or, you know, that's a best case scenario. Maybe he decided against having it out there in the public and he, you know, won't double down or rile people up even more. We can hope. But as of the recording of this podcast right now the post is down. The Instagram post that was originally linking to it is still up but I don't think he has said anything else other than the website was having some issues. So we shall see how this plays out.

Is this from a podcast or something?

 

[antsamthompson9]

Is this from a podcast or something?