Pre-existing Muppets on Sesame Street

While Kermit the Frog is perhaps the Muppet most famous for appearing on both Sesame Street and The Muppet Show, he is not the only character from The Muppet Show to appear on Sesame Street, nor is he the only character created before Sesame Street began production.

There was a question asked at Ask Henson.com regarding what characters appeared on both shows, and the response said that while Big Bird, Ernie, and Bert are the only Sesame Street Muppets to make guest appearances on the show (ignoring the fact that many Sesame Street Muppets appeared in the episode with Marty Feldman), Kermit was the only regular character on both shows. This response also acknowledges the fact that Rowlf the Dog appeared in the Sesame Street Pitch Reel, made before Sesame Street first aired. However, Rowlf did in fact appear in a Sesame Street segment: he made a cameo in Nine Song (Song of Nine), announcing nine lights.

Most of the Muppets who appeared on Sesame Street during the first season had either previously been created for earlier productions, were rebuilt versions of characters created for earleir productions, or were made from puppets used in previous productions, only with some alterations. One of the most notable of these characters is Beautiful Day Monster who was rebuilt on Sesame Street and made many appearances during the first season. The first sketch with Beautiful Day Monster, on The Ed Sullivan Show, ended with him shrinking, and a number of different puppets were used for the effect. The smallest version of the puppet appeared alongside the regular-sized version in one Sesame Street sketch.

Some other characters were rebuilt. Splurge appeared in one sketch in the form of a puppet rather than a full-body character. Some puppets were also altered as other characters. Grump made a few appearances redressed in hippie attire and with a hippie beard. The Kenner Gooney Bird puppet was refurbruished into Little Bird. The Gleep puppet was used as the original gray-green Grover, before Grover was rebuilt as a blue monster.

Other characters from earlier productions who appeared on the show during the first season include Fred, Scudge, Baby Monster, Baskerville the Hound, and the Snerfs. The design of Guy Smiley, and perhaps other characters made from the Orange Gold Anything Muppet, is similar to that of an earlier character known as Conrad Love. The Cookie Monster puppet is similar to that of a number of monsters who had previously been created by Jim Henson, including Arnold the Munching Monster, a monster created for Munchos commercials.

After the first season, most of the Muppets who had been created for earleir productiosn stopped appearing in new material on Sesame Street, though skits with them continued to be shown in new episodes for years. Kermit, Cookie Monster, and Grover all remained regular characters. Another early Sesame Street character to be simialr in vocie and appearance to an earlier character was Bip Bipodotta, who was very similar in design to Mahna Mahna. Later on, when the song "Mahna Mahna" became more associated with The Muppet Show, Bip Bipodotta was given his name, to make him into a more different character.

Aside from thse, pictures of Miss Piggy and Dr. Teeth have appeared in the background of some Sesame Street sketches, and the Muppet Chickens appeared in a number of Sesame Street sketches, before a different design of chickens were used, so that The Muppet Show and Sesame Street would have different chickens.