Little things we've noticed

[LittleJerry92]

Also, in regards to the Mystery Guest skit, we still got the wonderful core Muppet quartet: Jim, Jerry, Frank and Richard.

 

[cjd874]

Inserts that have a large number of AMs in the background generally will show at least two of the same pattern. Then you've got "Kids Just Love to Brush," which, IIRC, has four each of the lavender, green, and mini-pink AMs.

But I'm sure having multiples of the same AM pattern comes in handy, say one of them was to get damaged and had to go in for repairs, they'd have spares on-hand to use in the meantime. While not usually seen on camera, I know they had multiple Rowlf's and Kermit's at one point.

When I saw "Women Can Be," "The Subway," and other pieces with a LOT of Muppets, that's when it dawned on me that Jim's puppet builders made multiple versions of each puppet. They probably did the same thing on The Muppet Show and Fraggle Rock as well...if Kermit, Fozzie Bear, Gobo, or Sprocket got damaged, they would certainly need to use temporary backup puppets.

 

[cjd874]

Also, in regards to the Mystery Guest skit, we still got the wonderful core Muppet quartet: Jim, Jerry, Frank and Richard.

We sure did. Was it one of the last times they performed in a Sesame Street sketch together? In the eighties, Frank and Jim kept doing their Bert and Ernie bits, and Jerry and Richard would work together as the Two-Headed Monster or Biff and Sully. But after 1980 or so, Jim and Frank spent less time on SS, leaving Jerry, Richard, Caroll and newcomers like Marty Robinson and Kevin Clash to handle the performing duties. I am hard-pressed to think of a sketch where the core Muppeteer quartet did a stand-alone SS sketch after 1980.

 

[LittleJerry92]

Well, there's the first and last remake with Grover which I'm pretty sure is from 1981.

 

[LittleJerry92]

I noticed interestingly enough how Mr. Johnson has ordered a burger at Charlie's at least four times.

....and the only time he gets one is when he doesn't want one.

Actually, I stand corrected. He does get his burger in the Charlie's birthday skit. He just doesn't get to eat it because the table was taken away.

 

[minor muppetz]

That Mystery Guest skit has one of the most unusual character selections I've ever seen: Guy Smiley, Don Music, Cookie Monster, and Sherlock Hemlock! Aside from large ensemble skits or songs, I can't think of anything else with such a diverse group of Muppets.

I feel the same way about another game show sketch, What Is It?, featuring Guy Smiley, Grover, Biff, and Prairie Dawn (and I think Gladys appears as well).

I often wonder about the Anything Muppet patterns. There's clearly multiples of a few, but how many AM characters have eventually gotten built into their own, more permanent puppet? I recall a Henson or Sesame Workshop insider saying on a Muppet Wiki talk page that that usually happens when an AM design is used enough, but I wonder the extent of it. The Count most likely has had his own puppet for years, but I also recall seeing an '80s interview with Jim Henson somewhere where he talked about The Count as if they were still just applying the right parts to the AM pattern when needed.

I'd like to think that The Count, Mumford, Biff, Sully, Guy Smiley, Mr. Johnson, Simon Soundman, Sherlock Hemlock, and some others were major enough to have been built into their own puppets at some point. There are characters who seem to look a little different from appearance to appearance, maybe they just never became major enough. I feel Little Jerry and the Monotones all look somewhat different in each appearance, and I think Mr. Johnson also looked a little different each time until maybe around 2007.

Whether or not they eventually made a more permanent Biff puppet, during the 1970s it seems like he sometimes looks a little different. Often his face placement looks a little off, sometimes I feel his nose looks a little bigger than usual. And while we rarely see him without a hat, I feel like sometimes his hair looks a little different (though in some cases I feel the hat was put on slightly differently than usual, maybe the hair was put on a little different as well).

When I first saw a still from the "We Coulda" number, which is probably the most Biff was ever seen without a hat, I was surprised by how long and messy his hair looked. Then I watched some Biff scenes, ones where he's wearing his hat, and looking at how his hair looked with his hat on there, thought it did look like a lot of the hair sticking up was showing pushed down to the sides when he wears his hat. Then I saw the whole segment, and with the four parts where he's shown without a hat, feel like it alternates between how I expected Biff to look like without his hat and not. Though I think maybe they combed his hair for the scenes where he's an actor and a writer. And in most of those shots, we only get a view of one side of his head (when he's a doctor, we see a side view, and a little 3/4 angle of his face, we get two quick shorts where he's looking at the camera... and when he's a president, we do see multiple angles of his head.... and in some of those shots, he's a little far back from the camera). And yet in that same number, when he's wearing any kind of hat, I feel like the hair doesn't seem as messy/sticky (especially not when he's wearing a chef's hat, though that's another quick one where we just see the front of his head). Even if they were still just decorating the AM pattern to be Biff, I doubt they would have just replaced his hair for multiple parts of the same segment (especially when you consider that in all those imagine spots, they still wear the majority of their regular clothes, mainly just changing headgear).

 

[LittleJerry92]

Besides the fact that the crew forgot to take off the guitarist's guitar when they used the puppets for the Nickmatics as the roles for the waiters in Nino's (on another subject: I remember as a kid being confused why the Nickmatics were at Nino's until I learned the fun of music videos; just playing different roles. ), has anyone noticed when Nick is talking to his "dad", the latter's arm for whatever reason is being held off-screen before lip-syncing?

 

[D'Snowth]

I honestly don't know. It feels like the lavender puppet was meant to be its replacement to begin with.

I think probably because those primitive early videotape cameras couldn't record that color very well . . . remember, Jim's original design for Oscar was for him to be purple, but the cameras made that color look like a washed-out magenta . . . and if you look at the really early seasons with those purple AMs - particularly the minis - they don't look very purply, and they do kind of have a washed-out magenta look to them.

 

[LittleJerry92]

Do you mean the reddish-magenta AM?

 

[minor muppetz]

Often when broadcast versions of songs are included on albums, they'll use pre-recorded tracks as opposed to just taking the audio from the master video tape. This is evident in certain lines of spoken dialogue that played over the music being ommitted (like Biff's spoken dialogue and the hammering sounds in "We Coulda").

But then in "I'm Square", the audio release includes Bert's opening reaction line to being called square, even though it doesn't include Maria and Bert's conversation that would have given it better context. When watching that segment, I feel like Bert's voice sounds a little different in audio quality before the music starts. I would have the reaction line would have been said live as opposed to pre-recorded along with the singing.