Caroll Spinney characters

Caroll Spinney most notably performed Big Bird and Oscar the Grouch on Sesame Street for fifty years.

What is not as well known, however, is that Spinney also performed a number of other characters, usually Anything Muppets, in the earlier seasons of the show. Spinney also performed Muppet versions of his pre-Sesame Street characters Picklepuss and Pop in a Muppet production, and made several cameos on the show.

Named characters

Granny Bird

Granny Fanny Nesselrode

Bruno the Trashman

Shivers the Penguin

Bennett Snerf

Richie / Fremont

season 3 Mama Bear

Ira

Duke David

Ludwig of Liverwurst

Professor Goldfinch

Tough Luck Lester

Penelope Pepperpot

Adrienne in "A, You're Adorable"

Shared characters

Recurring characters shared among performers.

Sam the Robot in Episode 0461

Lefty the Salesman in
sketches for U and P&R

Billy in "IS" sketch

Fenwick in "Monster Tug-of-War" (First: Episode 0261)

proto-Grover in "Monsters Look at A"

Cookie Monster and Beautiful Day Monster in "Monsters Whisper C"

Beautiful Day Monster, here named "Snooky," in Ernie and Bert sketch (First: Episode 0023)

Hippie in Kermit's hair lecture

Scudge and Fred's son in "First and Last"

Ancillary characters

Unnamed Anything Muppets, monsters, etc.

Mother in "Consider Yourself"
(dialogue only)

sibling in "Five People in My Family"

son in "Children Song"

Pumpkin pilot in "Yellow Submarine"

Purple AM in "Everyone Likes Ice Cream"

"Can You Guess?" panelist #3

little boy and man in "Lulu's Back in Town"

Reddish-Magenta AM in "Goin' for a Ride"

Fat Blue man in Kermit looks for clues

the farmer in "The Magic Apple"

postman Rubber Ball

Pumpkin AM in "Surprise!"

Pumpkin AM in "Wonderful/Yucchy"

AM in "Cookie Monster Goes to School"

LittleBird-PET.jpg

AM girl in "ET quickies" (First: Episode 0165)

Lavender AM in baseball sketch (First: Episode 0193)

Polly's mother (First: Episode 0217)

Spinney in Grover Monotones walk sketch.jpg

Lavender AM in Grover and Monotones WALK sketch (First: Episode 0221)

The King in "Cutie and the Beast"

AM in "Mad"

Rubber Ball (second from left) in basketball sketch (First: Episode 0267)

Mother in Family Arrangement sketch (First: Episode 0275)

Audio voices

Characters and voiceovers performed off-screen.

The Cookie Tree

Strange Little Man in
"The Magic Cookie"

singing "Rockabye Baby" to a koala in a season one film
(First: Episode 0048)

announcing the sponsors in Episode 0006

Episode 0600, Scene 4

Concert announcer for "Concerto for Cigar Box, Washtub and Jug"
(First: Episode 1222)

Honorary Mentions

• In the audio cassette version of the book A Sesame Street Christmas, Caroll Spinney as Big Bird reads a story that includes his imitations of Bert, Ernie, Betty Lou, and Grover. Another story on the tape finds Caroll Spinney as Oscar imitating Big Bird.

• Spinney narrates several of the audio adaptations of the Sesame Street Start-to-Read Book series, sometimes doing other character voices. Other examples can be found on Sesame Street records including Big Bird presents Hans Christian Andersen.

Notes

• Despite his claims to the contrary, Spinney never performed Elmo.
• Daniel Seagren once filled in as Big Bird when Spinney was sick in Episode 0083. Similarly, Jim Henson filled in as Oscar for Episode 0084.

Scripts

Scripts that credit Spinney as playing various characters for which no a/v evidence is available.

• Episode 0277 — AM lady
• Episode 0282 — AM boy & girl
• Episode 0322 — AM kid
• Episode 0327 — AM kid
• Episode 0340 — AM kid
• Episode 0356 — Ferris (AM boy)
• Episode 0358 — Ferris (AM boy)
• Episode 0376 — AM kid
• Episode 0378 — AM kid
• Episode 0384 — AM boy
• Episode 0387 — AM girl

See also

• Caroll and Debra Spinney Cameos