I think it's interesting that Disney felt they needed the Henson family's blessings to fire Steve Whitmire, as if they have final say (since they don't control who performs the Muppets anymore, Disney does). Makes me wonder if they asked the family for their opinion on whether to fire Steve, thinking the news would look better if they had the Henson approval (and if they didn't have the support at all, what would they have done?).
I have wondered how the other performers felt about this. I wouldn't be surprised if they felt conflicted - after all, they were close to him for so long, yet they probably still need/want the work (though at least three of the current performers are still active on Sesame Street). Of course it wouldn't be the first time that the cast or crew of something continued working in spite of somebody getting very badly fired or betrayed (though the original cast and crew of Saturday Night Live did leave when Lorne Michaels left because they felt he was betrayed by NBC for keeping the show on the air when he left, or something like that).
I've been surprised to hear about Steve making so many unreasonable demands and such. In interviews and his blog posts, he often seems to be very humble, and it's often been said that he's shy, unless that's changed over the years (I mostly hear about his shyness in regards to the Muppet Show/Fraggle Rock era), someone who might want to fight for what he thinks is right but who would still go with it if denied.
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