The Fuzz Brothers: are they upside down or are we?

[Dearth]

I was watching the Beverly Sills episode earlier tonight, and got curious about the 'Fuzz Brothers', namely who played them.

I poked around online and found very little info about the characters, but what info I did find, I disagree with. On the Muppet wiki, it says that the performers are lying on their backs with their chins in the air.

I say the camera is upside down and they're standing behind a bluescreen wall from the chin down. The legs of their hat/puppet-bodies are affixed to something above them.

Watch the one on the left (or the right if you by chance decide to lie upside down to watch this, or flip your iPod around the other way, or whatever) and near the end of the skit, the straight edge of this rigid bluescreen wall becomes evident.

If they were upside down, this hanging straight edge would have been resting rather heavily across their Adam's apples. It would have made far more sense to simply drape blue fabric over their prone bodies. And that method would clearly not have produced a harsh straight edge in the composite.

Sure, Muppet performers are used to uncomfortable working conditions, and will sacrifice comfort for the sake of a shot... but Jim Henson was also brilliant at simplifying techniques in unexpected ways, and I really feel like in this case, they would have chosen to invert the camera rather than the performers.

If anyone has or can point me to some behind-the-scenes photos, that would be wonderful.

Any thoughts?

Dearth

 

[terrimonster]

You're definitely right -- the performers are right-side-up. If you look at some of the ornamentation on the characters' chests, you'll see that gravity is pulling them "up." Though I doubt the camera was upside-down. It would be easier to flip the video image than to flip the cameras.

As for performers, Jerry Nelson is on the left (screen left). Muppet Wiki says the other is Jim Henson, and I'm inclined to agree, though the beard looks a bit off to me at first glance (probably due to the "hair" style).

 

[Dearth]

Good eye on the anti-gravity ornamentation on their bodies. That's even better proof than the straight-line of the bluescreen that I was fixated on. Someone should edit the MuppetWiki entry.

Yeah, you're right, I used the word camera when I more properly should have said image, but I was thinking illustratively, in direct response to someone saying the performers were upside down.

I'm with you on the identification of the performers, too. Jerry Nelson is a cinch, but the one that is probably Jim doesn't feel 100% right to me. At first, I thought it might be Dave Goelz, actually, but I'm more inclined to agree now that it is Jim.

Dearth

 

[Dearth]

I noticed a typo at the Muppet Wiki that was really bothering me, so I created an account and edited it... while I was in there, I altered the Fuzz Brothers entry so it no longer says they were upside down.

Dearth

 

[Dearth]

If anyone wants to know what they looked like right side up when it was being filmed, I just uploaded this to YouTube...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bYDstBRfs8s

Alex
(aka Dearth)

 

[Dearth]

By the way, I had a gut feeling when I was flipping that clip that it was NOT rotated 180 degrees, that it had only been mirrored vertically. I tried it both ways, but the 180 one just didn't seem right.

The only thing I really was able to check though was an asymmetrical crooked tooth in the mouth of one of the Fuzz Brothers. Sure enough, I have since observed that same tooth in clips of Jim Henson speaking, and in a couple of photos. My mirror-flipped video is correct.

Alex