Are there Season 1 shows floating around?

[fuzzygobo]

Here's Guy Smiley's first appearance...

It's interesting. I think Caroll Spinney performs Guy in this one. It barely sounds like any Spinney voice I know of, but at times in the sketch he sort of talks like the farmer Caroll performed in The Magic Apple segment. The voice kind of has a cartoony quality to it. The performance also doesn't seem as stiff or awkward as some of the Anything Muppets Caroll Spinney performed. Assuming that it's Caroll, I wonder if this is the only solo Anything Muppet sketch he performed in.

The Brand X sketch is funny (for years I've desired to do a sketch comedy "commercial" that ends with the spokesman saying "do not buy this product", I think this is the first time I've seen a "commercial" with a line like that), but it seems more like entertainment than educational. It barely teaches the letter X, with the letter only being part of the brand name. It would have been great if the stains were shaped like the letter X. The first season show content lists episode 10 as the only episode from the first season to include it, though the document doesn't have a "dump" note by it so it might have aired in later seasons.

It's interesting how in the first season they seemed to avoid giving recurring minor characters names, or consistent names. Various monsters and Anything Muppets are seen a lot but are rarely mentioned by name, even if they star in the sketches. There are times when Cookie Monster, Beautiful Day Monster, or Grover interact with Ernie or Kermit or somebody, and yet they tend to avoid mentioning the names (though Beautiful Day Monster was referred to by a number of different names in various segments). There's at least three different segments where Betty Lou is referred to by a different name (she's Helen Happy in one segment, Lucy Jones in another, and she's called Betty Lou in The Mr. and Mrs. Game). And then Guy Smiley goes from being an unnamed spokesman (I assume the script didn't refer to him by any sort of proper name) to being called Sonny Friendly and then finally he's called Guy Smiley, all in the first season.

Guy Smiley in the Brand X skit doesn't sound nasal enough to be Caroll, but possibly John Lovelady (Ernie's right hand in these early days).

 

[cjd874]

Guy Smiley in the Brand X skit doesn't sound nasal enough to be Caroll, but possibly John Lovelady (Ernie's right hand in these early days).

Hmmm, you might be right about that. I forgot that John L. used to work on SS back then.

And to quote Drtooth, this sketch would have been much more hilarious with the revamped Guy Smiley voice as done by Jim Henson. This brings to mind the 15 commercial from the Count Counts album (1975), which always made me laugh when listening to it. Yes, I have it on vinyl… (start at 5:39)

 

[Drtooth]

Seeing all these early skits confirms for me the idea, as stated by Joan Ganz Cooney and many others, that Sesame Street was inspired by Laugh-In in its earliest stages. Couldn't you see the Brand X commercial being done on Laugh-In? Or a wacky bit like "Ernie and the egg" or "The A TV"? Even as it progressed into the 1970s and 1980s, it still had those traces of Laugh-In…and then to top it off, Ruth Buzzi (a former Laugh-In cast member) joined the cast 25 years later!

It seems like that, but just a little restrained. Things weren't defined, they didn't find the limit they could push things, and there was a different balance of the Muppet presence on the show. Not saying this stuff isn't funny. It is, but it's missing something that would be better established the further the show went on. There's a few skits based on building puppets that was mercifully replaced with defined levels of illusion. There are obvious things that were yet to happen to the series, and that's understandable. This is pre-Grover, Cookie Monster (as Cookie Monster, not the monster that eats stuff) stuff that got better in following seasons.

Still think they could have remade that Guy Smiley brand X skit with Jim shouting the lines and getting exasperated after the product doesn't do what it was supposed to. It misses that energy.

 

[Oscarfan]

What confuses me slightly about the Brand X thing is that it's apparently about the letter X, yet clearly teaches the lesson of "before" and "after". It also needed the comedy third thing or some stronger punchline. that can all be chalked up to early season wonkiness.

 

[zns]

Hmmm, you might be right about that. I forgot that John L. used to work on SS back then.

And to quote Drtooth, this sketch would have been much more hilarious with the revamped Guy Smiley voice as done by Jim Henson. This brings to mind the 15 commercial from the Count Counts album (1975), which always made me laugh when listening to it. Yes, I have it on vinyl… (start at 5:39)

That is one of the best Sesame Street albums ever made. If anyone has the episode it was made into along with Bert and Ernie Sing-Along, hopefully they will bring that up.

 

[minor muppetz]

I wonder if maybe Daniel Segren performed Guy in the Brand X segment. I know that he performed Big Bird in a few episodes during the first season, so he would have been performing that season. But there aren't many known voices by Daniel Segren (many fans say that he performed Snarl in The Great Santa Claus Switch, but how do we know that?). I don't think Segren's performance as Big Bird is on YouTube for us to compare.

 

[Drtooth]

What confuses me slightly about the Brand X thing is that it's apparently about the letter X, yet clearly teaches the lesson of "before" and "after". It also needed the comedy third thing or some stronger punchline. that can all be chalked up to early season wonkiness.

Probably what the thing is missing. A third example, and a more stressed out salesman. I like the punchline, but it seems that it needed to be delivered under more duress. But yeah. First season and all. It's clear that the formula for these sketches was still being tweaked.

 

[hooperfan]

I wonder if maybe Daniel Segren performed Guy in the Brand X segment. I know that he performed Big Bird in a few episodes during the first season, so he would have been performing that season. But there aren't many known voices by Daniel Segren (many fans say that he performed Snarl in The Great Santa Claus Switch, but how do we know that?). I don't think Segren's performance as Big Bird is on YouTube for us to compare.

He's performing Big Bird in this show:

 

[minor muppetz]

With so many of the earliest episodes being out there now, I'd be content if these were the last "new" rare classic content the fans get for the rest of the year. But I will be happy if other rarities pop up as well.

 

[hooperfan]

Never can have too many "rarities" when it comes to Sesame Street... I am so grateful to finally see more early shows after waiting for so long... I thought when Noggin appeared in the late 90s that the full series would be shown (boy, was I naïve)...but it was certainly nice to get to watch episodes from '69 through the 70s and 80s, many of which I had never seen before...but there are so many episodes still in the vaults that will probably never see the light of day, and it's doubtful that they will all be "leaked", but I have hope that more goodies will be coming up in the future..

A shout out to Rugratskid for giving me access to these shows...I never thought I'd ever get to see the first 3 weeks of the show (minus 12 and 15, but still...)