Ever since I realized Eric Jacobson has taken over Fozzie, Piggy, etc. (and I'm ashamed to admit how long it took me to discover this) it has had me wondering:
Why? Why did Frank Oz leave the Muppets? Perhaps a more knowledgable member here might know, but let's face it: Everything Frank has career-wise is due to his work with the Muppets. All the other projects its lead to evolved out of his work with Jim and the Company. Doesn't that make it seem he's sort of a traitor for abandoning them to make horrible movies like the Stepford Wives remake? (I actually like all of his movies except that one).
He was young when he started, and it isn't all that old now, so it's not like retirement a la Jerry Nelson. Was he bitter that Marlon brando chastised him while filming "The Score" and wouldn't take direction from him because he was better at "sticking his hand up a pig's ***** and making it talk"?
Did he want to remove himself from the muppets because of that?
I suppose this is sort of an ethical dilemma: is it Frank's right to abandon the Muppets after 40-odd years as their creative nucleus, owing them all the success he's achieved as a filmmaker? Doesn't he owe the company more than that? Or should he be able to do so, feeling perhaps that he had accomplished all he could and needed to pursue other things?
I know that he even persuaded George Lucas to make Yoda CG for Ep. 2 &3 because he didn't want to do the puppet, like it was some burden on him. Does he just want to abandon puppetry altogether?
This thread might stir up a hornet's nest,
but I think its worth discussing.