Ventriloquist?

[Java]

Was Jim also a ventriloquist. It seems that when I'm watching clips of interviews of Jim with Kermit at the same time and they include both of them on the screen together he works very hard and throwing his voice to keep the appearance up. Is this true or is it that they are just on screen so little at once together that I want this to be true?

I can't seem to find any reference to this anywhere and when I search if this has ever been discussed before here the search feature throws out the word ventriloquist. Go figure.

 

[Ilikemuppets]

He really had no need for being one, because he made you believe that you we're actually talking a puppet as if you we're casually talking to another person. Sometimes you even forget he's even there. LOL!

 

[Java]

I agree that it he didn't need to be but did he try to be or is it just my perception of the interviews that I try to see this?

 

[Ilikemuppets]

Have no idea and sorry I can not help.

 

[MelissaY1]

He's actually said in one TV interview that he's "not a ventriloquist and he doesn't try to hide the fact that he's performing the voice".

 

[Ilikemuppets]

Gotta pay more attention to those interviews.

 

[Java]

Me? I haven't spent a huge amount of time on them and maybe I just am slow, but to me it seems that way.

 

[Skekayuk]

Well interestingly TMS puppeteer Louise Gold is no ventriloquist either, but in 1987 she got cast in the role of Sister Amnesia in the OLC of Nunsense, mainly because that character has to do a bad ventriloquist act. Apparently her performance of it was a showstopper.

Emma

http://www.qsulis.demon.co.uk/Website_Louise_Gold/Nunsense_Stage.htm

 

[Squonk]

I remember seeing Jim Henson on The Tonight Show with Kermit once. Johnny Carson asked him about the fact that he was clearly not a ventriloquist and that he did not hide that fact when he appeared with Kermit. Carson, by the way, did perform as a vent in his youth...which may explain his question. Anyway, I'll never forget Henson's reply...

It was something along the lines of:

"I learned a long time ago that when the frog is speaking no one cares what the beareded man is doing."