{"id":157084,"date":"2018-03-17T09:08:50","date_gmt":"2018-03-17T13:08:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=157084"},"modified":"2018-03-17T09:08:50","modified_gmt":"2018-03-17T13:08:50","slug":"new-film-reveals-miss-piggys-backstory-more-muppet-secrets","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2018\/03\/17\/new-film-reveals-miss-piggys-backstory-more-muppet-secrets\/","title":{"rendered":"New film reveals Miss Piggy’s backstory, more Muppet secrets"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"(Photo:<\/a>
Piggy went to charm school once she got to the Big Apple (Photo<\/a>: Miss Piggy\/Facebook<\/a>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

LOS ANGELES — Only Miss Piggy’s creator knows the depths of her tragic origin story. Frank Oz, who gave life to the character in the early 1970s, says Piggy left her hometown farm for life in the big city after her dad died in a tractor accident and she had a falling out with her mother.<\/p>\n

Piggy went to charm school once she got to the Big Apple, Oz says, \u201cbut she had to pay for it, so she did some things she wasn’t proud of.\u201d (A bacon commercial, he adds.)<\/p>\n

Gonzo’s daring nature was born out of puppeteer Dave Goelz’s personal insecurities, and actor\/puppeteer Jerry Nelson drew on Eeyore’s depressive demeanour to create Snuffleupagus’ signature phrase — \u201cOh, dear\u201d — on \u201cSesame Street.\u201d<\/p>\n

It takes more than a wacky voice to bring a Muppet to life. Every character has a detailed backstory dreamed up by the puppeteer behind it — or rather, beneath it. The artists who created some of the Muppets’ most beloved characters — Cookie Monster, Grover, Count von Count, Bunsen Honeydew, Animal, Prairie Dawn and Pepe the King Prawn — shed light on their creative processes and their characters’ secret backstories in a new documentary, \u201cMuppet Guys Talking ,\u201d available online Friday.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is a great opportunity to show people who the people were underneath,\u201d says Oz, who directed the film. \u201cBesides the idea of showing the world the culture in which we lived and worked because of (Muppets creator) Jim (Henson).\u201d<\/p>\n

Featuring original Muppet performers Oz, Goelz and Nelson, along with Fran Brill and Bill Barretta, the 65-minute documentary is a love letter to Henson and the creative community he developed. The five artists discuss their memories, moments of inspiration and the challenges of working with puppets.<\/p>\n

For example, during the opening of 1979’s \u201cThe Muppet Movie,\u201d in which Kermit sits on a log in the middle of a lake, strumming a banjo, the six-foot-tall Henson was crunched into a steel canister underwater. His arm was overhead, controlling Kermit, and a microphone ran into the submerged container to capture Henson’s voice.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe would do anything,\u201d Goelz says. \u201cI think we all learned commitment from that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Henson also welcomed ideas from everyone, from the puppeteers to the prop builders and electricians.<\/p>\n

\u201cHis appreciation of people was beyond my range,\u201d says Goelz, who counts Gonzo, Bunsen Honeydew and Boober Fraggle among his creations.<\/p>\n

Outrageousness was always welcomed, Oz says, and kindness was king.<\/p>\n

\u201cAll the sweetness came from Jim,\u201d Oz says.<\/p>\n

The film includes archival footage of the late Muppet originator, along with clips of late writers and puppeteers, including Richard Hunt, who played Scooter and Janice on \u201cThe Muppet Show\u201d and Don Music on \u201cSesame Street.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cMuppet Guys Talking\u201d is dedicated to Nelson, who died shortly after filming his appearance in the documentary.<\/p>\n

He and the other puppeteers said the greatest misconception about their work is that they’re only responsible for the Muppets’ voices.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe voices are just five per cent,\u201d Oz says.<\/p>\n

That’s why character backstories are so important. Because performers would often improvise during the creative process, knowing Miss Piggy’s or Gonzo’s motivations would help inform their reactions in any given scene.<\/p>\n

It was improv that led Gonzo to have a thing for chickens, Goelz says in the film.<\/p>\n

The physical work involved with making Muppets come to life is also highly specialized. Not only do the puppeteers need to translate their performances into puppets high above their heads, they need to do so with awareness of their fellow performers and of the camera positions capturing the action.<\/p>\n

Brill’s height presented a challenge when she first joined the Muppet cast: She’s nearly a foot shorter than Oz and the other artists. Set workers created a pair of super-tall platform boots so Brill’s arm, and the puppet on top of it, would match the guys’. The film includes an illustration of her makeshift platforms.<\/p>\n

Considering the impact and popularity of the Muppets at their height in the early 1980s, it’s surprising there aren’t more documentaries about the making of the phenomenon.<\/p>\n

Brill said that in the Muppets’ early days, Henson discouraged puppeteers from posing for photos with their characters to help suspend disbelief for young audiences. Oz still won’t pose with any of his puppet personae, nor does he perform their voices.<\/p>\n

He didn’t even want to make \u201cMuppet Guys Talking,\u201d but his wife, Victoria Labalme, insisted on it.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe saw the way we worked, the culture that Jim created, and she had never seen that kind of work,\u201d Oz recalls. \u201cShe said, ‘People should be aware that people can work like this — without backstabbing, without politics, but just working for the quality of the product.’<\/p>\n

\u201cShe badgered me for about a year and I finally said OK.\u201d<\/p>\n

Oz, too, distanced himself from his Muppet work when he transitioned to directing in 1982. He said he planned to give himself 10 years to learn the craft, but Henson expedited that when he tapped Oz to co-direct \u201cThe Dark Crystal.\u201d<\/p>\n

Oz’s other directing credits include \u201cLittle Shop of Horrors,\u201d \u201cDirty Rotten Scoundrels,\u201d \u201cWhat About Bob?\u201d and \u201cBowfinger.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cEventually people saw me as a director, and then I could really appreciate the Muppets part of me,\u201d he says. \u201cThat I was safe enough that I wasn’t labeled as one thing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Now Oz says he misses puppeteering. Apart from reprising his appearance as Yoda in \u201cStar Wars: The Last Jedi,\u201d he hasn’t performed with a puppet for more than a decade.<\/p>\n

\u201cNo one asks me anymore,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

Besides, he adds, there was something truly special about Henson’s Muppet environment, where the characters and the people creating them were all equally close.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese characters are believable because our relationship down below is believable and real,\u201d Oz says. \u201cThe actual humour and the heart, it doesn’t come from the puppets. It comes from the people underneath who’ve been working with each other for so many years.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

LOS ANGELES — Only Miss Piggy’s creator knows the depths of her tragic origin story. Frank Oz, who gave life …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":157085,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,106],"tags":[48517,48516,48518],"class_list":["post-157084","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","category-hollywood","tag-frank-oz","tag-miss-piggy","tag-muppet","mauthors-sandy-cohen","mauthors-the-associated-press"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/157084","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/33"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=157084"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/157084\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/157085"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=157084"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=157084"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=157084"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}