Where are all these classic Sesame Street episodes coming from?

[LittleJerry92]

It seems like up until Telly was around you didn’t really see monsters that much on the street to begin with.

 

[MuppetSpot]

Edit: Or I at least feel like there was a division: it was commonplace to see characters like Big Bird, Oscar, Elmo, Abby, Baby Bear, Zoe, Rosita, etc. on the street, but more of a rarity to see Ernie, Bert, Cookie, Grover and others.

Count and Herry are the in between characters between street scenes and inserts.

 

[Cookie3001]

Ernie also appeared on the street in the opening scene for the Put Down the Duckie pledge special and was used as a street puppet for a short time in the early 2000's

 

[Cookie3001]

Kermit also made very few street appearances. We all saw him in the series premier and the episode where Slimey goes to the moon but apparently he also appeared in a scene from Episode 295 where he goes in a box, in Big Bird's nest and a bunch of other places to demonstrate in, out and on but finishes the demonstration on Oscar's can

No footage is available but I found this on Muppet Wiki's Twitter page so they might upload at least a small part of the sketch at some point. Also this would have been one of the frogs only interactions with Oscar. He also appeared in a scene from the Put Down the Duckie pledge special where he asks Oscar questions about why he likes public television (the scene was cut on home video releases)

 

[cjd874]

If I could have one criticism of Sesame Street, it's that the Muppets didn't appear in the street scenes enough -- to steal a clip from LittleJerry, this is one of my favorites:

This kiss for little bitty Ernie... ****!

Heck, so much of the early years is unknown that maybe there was more stuff like this.

Edit: Or I at least feel like there was a division: it was commonplace to see characters like Big Bird, Oscar, Elmo, Abby, Baby Bear, Zoe, Rosita, etc. on the street, but more of a rarity to see Ernie, Bert, Cookie, Grover and others.

Well, that's true these days because there is a lot of focus on the "core six" Muppets: Elmo, Abby, Cookie Monster, Big Bird, Grover, and Oscar. But back in the 1970s, Frank Oz, Jim Henson, and Jerry Nelson were available more often to perform in street scenes. It must have been cool to turn on the TV and see Grover, Cookie Monster, the Count, or SAM the Robot in a street scene rather than Oscar or Big Bird. (Of course, Caroll Spinney did a great job holding down the fort in the other puppeteers' absence.) And as time passed, the original performers moved on to other things; and new performers came in and established themselves (Marty Robinson, David Rudman, Kevin Clash, Leslie Carrara-Rudolph, etc.).

And you'd be right to say that there is probably more stuff like this in the old days...it just hasn't been discovered yet. Heck, when the video for Bert's song "I'm Square" was uploaded, it was a real treat for me and I watched it four times.

 

[hooperfan]

Kermit also made very few street appearances. We all saw him in the series premier and the episode where Slimey goes to the moon but apparently he also appeared in a scene from Episode 295 where he goes in a box, in Big Bird's nest and a bunch of other places to demonstrate in, out and on but finishes the demonstration on Oscar's can

No footage is available but I found this on Muppet Wiki's Twitter page so they might upload at least a small part of the sketch at some point. Also this would have been one of the frogs only interactions with Oscar. He also appeared in a scene from the Put Down the Duckie pledge special where he asks Oscar questions about why he likes public television (the scene was cut on home video releases)

Kermit and Oscar did interact one other time:

 

[Cookie3001]

Kermit and Oscar did interact one other time:

I know, I'm just saying he didn't interact with him as much as he did with most other characters and he didn't at all in the 70s

 

[minor muppetz]

I remember seeing the episode where Mr. Johnson eats at Hooper's Store, I actually don't remember seeing Grover on the street then, and I feel that would have stood out to me. I assume he was quiet, but I wonder if he's actually shown or they just acknowledge that Grover's there without showing. I've been thinking about this in the last few days and wondering if maybe I missed the part of the episode where Johnson comes back (I want to say that I did but I'm really not sure, I also don't remember Bob being there - all I really remember is Mr. Johnson going to Hooper's, interacting with Gina and talking about Grover's usual service, and them showing an existing Waiter Grover sketch).

Well, that's true these days because there is a lot of focus on the "core six" Muppets: Elmo, Abby, Cookie Monster, Big Bird, Grover, and Oscar. But back in the 1970s, Frank Oz, Jim Henson, and Jerry Nelson were available more often to perform in street scenes. It must have been cool to turn on the TV and see Grover, Cookie Monster, the Count, or SAM the Robot in a street scene rather than Oscar or Big Bird.

Sam the Robot was primarily in street scenes. I recall long ago on the forums somebody mentioning him only appearing in one insert, where he appears as a film projector or works one. Not sure if this actually exists or was just a faulty memory, so far I haven't seen such a scene mentioned in any Muppet Wiki guides, hopefully we'll learn soon via the trusted sources (or maybe an episode with that scene is among what Scott has footage of).

It seems like while those performers were more available during the early 1970s, Jim Henson seemed to be a lot less available for street scenes. In Caroll Spinney's book he says that for the second season they shot inserts in a different studio than the street scenes, though considering his provavbly faulty memory, I wonder if maybe he meant the first season, as with the main exception of the first episode, it's rare for any first season episodes to feature Jim or Frank in a street scene (that recently-found Grover clip where he greets Susan awkwardly has him on the limbo set when it seems he should have been on the street).

 

[PumpkinJ]

It seems like while those performers were more available during the early 1970s, Jim Henson seemed to be a lot less available for street scenes. In Caroll Spinney's book he says that for the second season they shot inserts in a different studio than the street scenes, though considering his provavbly faulty memory, I wonder if maybe he meant the first season, as with the main exception of the first episode, it's rare for any first season episodes to feature Jim or Frank in a street scene (that recently-found Grover clip where he greets Susan awkwardly has him on the limbo set when it seems he should have been on the street).

So regarding that recently-found "G for Grover" clip, I could assume the reason Grover was on the limbo set while he greets Susan (who was on the street) was because of said reason you pointed out saying "they shot inserts in a different studio than the street scenes". I could assume that's why many Muppet characters (aside from Big Bird and Oscar) barely ever appeared in street scenes during the first season, but I could be wrong. However, I read the guide for Episode 0044 on Muppet Wiki, and spotted that there was a monster on the street (presumably...?) during scenes 5, 6 and 7.

• SCENE 5: "After Susan finishes reading, she hears a commotion from Oscar's can. Oscar tells her that someone has been using his candles, reading his newspapers, and drinking his milk. The culprit turns out to be a monster, who decides to move in with Oscar."
• SCENE 6: "Oscar inhabits a trash can next to his, since he has difficulty getting the monster to leave. The hungry monster, looking for a cookie, devours one of Oscar's Aretha Franklin records."
• SCENE 7: "Oscar prepares to force the monster out of his can, but the monster has already decided to leave. He thanks Oscar for being nice and gives him a balloon, which upsets Oscar even more, because now he won't have anyone to bother him."

But because the footage for the episode is unavailable, I don't know whether Oscar's scene with a monster was filmed on the street or on a limbo set, given that a street scene from Episode 0021 with Big Bird and Beautiful Day Monster was oddly filmed on the limbo set. I will consider the monster from Episode 0044 another Season 1 street scene monster mystery aside from Episode 0021.

 

[minor muppetz]

So regarding that recently-found "G for Grover" clip, I could assume the reason Grover was on the limbo set while he greets Susan (who was on the street) was because of said reason you pointed out saying "they shot inserts in a different studio than the street scenes". I could assume that's why many Muppet characters (aside from Big Bird and Oscar) barely ever appeared in street scenes during the first season, but I could be wrong. However, I read the guide for Episode 0044 on Muppet Wiki, and spotted that there was a monster on the street (presumably...?) during scenes 5, 6 and 7.

• SCENE 5: "After Susan finishes reading, she hears a commotion from Oscar's can. Oscar tells her that someone has been using his candles, reading his newspapers, and drinking his milk. The culprit turns out to be a monster, who decides to move in with Oscar."
• SCENE 6: "Oscar inhabits a trash can next to his, since he has difficulty getting the monster to leave. The hungry monster, looking for a cookie, devours one of Oscar's Aretha Franklin records."
• SCENE 7: "Oscar prepares to force the monster out of his can, but the monster has already decided to leave. He thanks Oscar for being nice and gives him a balloon, which upsets Oscar even more, because now he won't have anyone to bother him."

Maybe it was Jim or Frank, or maybe it was a different performer who didn't do much in terms of characters (my guess would be Daniel Segren).

The first episode has plenty of Jim and Frank in addition to Caroll, episode 6 also has them performing hippies during the block party (considering it's a block party and they got them on the set, it's a shame they didn't use the opportunity to have Ernie, Bert, and Kermit at the party). Other than those, there's three episodes with Rufus (who I'm guessing was done by Frank on the show), and long ago, somebody at Toughpigs got in contact with Karen Falk and learned that it was Daniel Segren who performed Big Bird in episode 83, and possibly a few others, and in that correspondence it was said that Jim Henson did Oscar in those episodes. I would expect it to be within the vicinity of episode 83.