Muppet sex

Two Koozbanians perform the Galley-oh-hoop-hoop.

Fozzie receives a special invitation.

Kermit wants to know if Cher fools around.

Animal magnet and sticker.

The Muppets comic strip

Sexual discussion and heavy innuendo is not commonplace in the generally family-friendly productions of the Muppets; however, the characters have referenced their sex lives and the concept of intercourse on occasion.

References

• Appearing on her show in 1975, Kermit the Frog propositions Cher: "Do you, uh, fool around?"

• The original 1975 pilot for The Muppet Show was titled "Sex and Violence" in an attempt to show audiences that this Muppet show was for more "adult" audiences.

• The Land of Gortch segments on Saturday Night Live often featured the Muppet characters dealing with more adult subject matters - including drinking, drug use, sexual affairs, sex toys, and more.

• Kermit the Frog reports on the Galley-oh-hoop-hoop, the mating ritual of a species indigenous to the planet Koozebane, in The Muppets Valentine Show, and again in an episode of The Muppet Show.

• Speaking with Woman magazine in September 1977, Frank Oz explained that Miss Piggy's suffering in life had made her very promiscuous. "She's had affairs with most of the male Muppets except, of course, Kermit, the one she really wants."

• Raquel Welch's appearance on The Muppet Show in episode 311 strongly plays up her depiction in pop culture as a sex symbol, and uses that trope by having her toy with the idea of changing her image. In one scene, however, she earnestly comes on to Fozzie Bear, telling him he's "sexational." After singing "Confide in Me," she nervously invites him up to her dressing room.

• During a 1979 appearance on The Tonight Show, psychologist and practicing veterinarian Dr. Michael Fox talked with Kermit and Miss Piggy. Dr. Fox described the mating habits of frogs, to which Piggy responded, "Oh, I'd better remember that!" (Transcript)

• While reading the script for John Denver & the Muppets: A Christmas Together, Kermit recites, "a Christmas message from all of us to all of you: peace on Earth, goodwill toward men." Piggy stops to object about the omission of women from the statement. Denver's defense is that they took it from the Bible. Piggy counters, "the Bible is filled with women. This one begat that one and that one begat the other one... from all the begating that went on, it's quite obvious there was a great deal of goodwill toward women."

• Kermit uses a carpet cleaner called "Kiss My Karpet" in the September 26, 1982, edition of The Muppets comic strip. The phrase is a euphemism for cunnilingus.

• In the December 8, 1982, edition of The Muppets comic strip, Kermit and Rowlf are in a movie theater. Kermit asks Rowlf if he believes there's "too much sex in the cinema." Rowlf agrees, noticing they are surrounded by couples engaged in public displays of affection.

• Robin the Frog and his friend Porky discuss "the birds and the bees" in the April 7, 1983, strip.

• The August 7, 1985 comic strip depicts Fozzie finding a lamp half buried in the sand. After he rubs it vigorously, a genie emerges and slaps him for being fresh.

• Kermit the Frog was asked about his sex life by Joan Rivers during a 1986 appearance on Can We Talk? Rivers asks, "Are you sleeping with Miss Piggy? I wanna know." Kermit replies, "You can't come on television and ask me about... I-I'm on Sesame Street for goodness sakes!" After some laughter from the panel and audience, Rivers asks Kermit to rate himself in bed on a scale of 1 to 10. "Are we talking about sex?" Kermit asks. After some back and forth, Kermit finally gestures to his lower regions and explains, "this is the complete Kermit that you're looking at." This finally puts the issue to bed. (YouTube)

• Frank Oz describes Animal in Henson's Place in five words: "Sex, sleep, food, drums, and pain. That's Animal's character." (video)

• During the end credits for Gonzo Presents Muppet Weird Stuff, the camera pans to a lava lamp prompting Gonzo's proposition to Camilla, "We can neck now." Necking usually refers to a particularly amorous form of kissing that often serves as foreplay.

• After Colleen Barker is kidnapped by Bugsy Them in Dog City, his proletariat companion Miss Belle uses her temporary position of authority to take the well-to-do Barker down a peg by accusing her of "turning tricks" on street corners; an idiom for selling sex acts for money, used in this case to describe her alleged offers to "jump through a hoop for a quarter" or "catch a frisbee for a dime."

• Dr. Teeth asks The Electric Mayhem what rock musicians want to do more than anything else in the world in The Muppets at Walt Disney World. Animal excitedly pops up and exclaims, "I know! I know!" Dr. Teeth doesn't let him answer and says, "Besides that."

• Before a commercial break in episode 105 of The Jim Henson Hour, Kermit tells the viewer what's coming up, then in an attempt to get more ratings adds, "and maybe some sex."

• When responding to the question of Bert and Ernie's sexual orientation, both Gary Knell and Steve Whitmire have, at different times, responded with some form of "they don't exist below the waist" — implying that romantic pairings in general have a direct correlation with one's ability to engage in sexual activity.

• In 1997, Kermit the Frog and Ulrika Jonsson sang "Makin' Whoopee," a song about intercourse.

• Ordering dinner in a spoof of When Harry Met Sally in Muppets Tonight episode 103, Miss Piggy hysterically fakes a sneeze to prove a point to her dining companion Billy Crystal. The original scene from the movie features Meg Ryan faking an orgasm, an element closely emulated by Piggy in the re-creation.

• Kermit sings, "do I get to bed her there?" in the song "Firefly" about a woman who's a "gad about" (a habitual pleasure-seeker).

• The only Seinfeld Babies sketch on Muppets Tonight appears in episode 107 and features a parody of the fourth season Seinfeld episode "The Contest," in which the main characters compete to see who can go the longest without masturbating. In a mash-up with Muppet Babies, Muppets Tonight shifts the focus of the contest on seeing which of the babies can go the longest without pooping in their diaper. Baby Kramer loses when he satisfyingly soils himself and announces, "I'm out."

• Trying to gain access to KMUP in Muppets Tonight episode 201, shows Bobo the cover of his album as identification. Thinking it's a Rorschach test, Bobo says he sees "my mother and a butterfly doing the mambo on an orange." The phrase "doing the mambo" is a euphemism for having sex, while sexual imagery is often associated with a Rorschach test.

• In one edition of "Journey to Ernie," Big Bird looks for Ernie at a museum of B words. He encounters the world's oldest letter B, who is very talkative about himself and his life experiences. As Big Bird shuffles off, the B claims the two of them could have discussed "the birds and the Bs."

• Profiled for Top Ten TV Bitches in 2001, Piggy resents the implication that she slept her way to the top. She clarifies, "I slept my way to the middle... and climbed the rest of the way, all by moi's self."

• Participating in the "Blondes Have More Fun" week on Hollywood Squares in May of 2003, Miss Piggy filmed a promo with Pamela Anderson. During one of the outtakes broadcast over the end credits, when Piggy descends below the wall of the square, Anderson teases, "While you're down there..."

• The same week on Hollywood Squares, Piggy is asked, "What are you doing to a frog if you turn it over and stroke its stomach?" Piggy replies, "Getting to third base."

• When Charles Gibson referred to Kermit as his adopted son on the June 28, 2006, episode of Good Morning America, Kermit asks "dad" if he could borrow the car tonight. Gibson warns him to stay out of the backseat, a popular place for youngsters to engage in intimacy, but Kermit assumes he's more likely to end up in the trunk.

• Kermit suggests in a 2006 MTV News interview that there's a (sex) tape of he and Pamela Anderson floating around.

• Oscar the Grouch invited Mike Rowe to enter his trash can by coming around to the back door in Episode 4178. Rowe gleefully replies, "The back door? Oh. I've always wanted to go in the back door." The Dirty Jobs host later acknowledged the exchange as an intentional dirty joke that he claims scandalized half of the audience.

• In A Muppets Christmas: Letters to Santa, "Mafia guy" (Tony Sirico) warns Pepe the King Prawn that he'd better not see him around his restaurant again, "or you're gonna sleep with the fishes." The phrase is usually attributed to the members of organized crime sealing someone's feet in concrete and throwing them in the river to drown. In this case, Pepe responds, "I already do," turning the meaning as expressed by the sea-dwelling prawn to one of sexual innuendo.

• When Miss Piggy appeared on Chelsea Lately in 2011 to promote The Muppets, host Chelsea Handler asked her if she could talk freely about her relationship with Kermit, specifically wanting to know if there's been penetration. Piggy says she likes to call it penne alla vodka, but laments that they've been so busy lately that they haven't seen each other at all. Handler claims she's evading the question; Piggy counters that she's evading the answer.

• During a Moviefone Unscripted appearance, when Kermit asks if Miss Piggy can impersonate other Muppet characters' voices, she states how she does him sometimes. Kermit then says, "I don't think we wanna talk about that on... on this. Oh, you mean the voice!"

• In a 2012 appearance on The Colbert Report, Muppet performer Frank Oz was asked by Stephen Colbert if Muppets have sex. Oz responded to the question with a flabbergasted "What?!?" (video)

• At a press conference for Muppets Most Wanted, Ricky Gervais asked Kermit and Miss Piggy why their babies are always shown on film as being either pigs or frogs instead of some kind of, as Tina Fey interjected, "abomination." Kermit claimed that it's because they've never actually "consummated the experiment."

• A season 46 entry of Smart Cookies is titled "Making Whoopie Pies in the Library" in reference to the euphemism for engaging in sex.

• When performing "Suffragette City" live, as they did at The Muppets Take the Bowl and The Muppets Take the O2, the Electric Mayhem include David Bowie's lyric "wham-bam thank you ma'am," an epithet for a "quickie."

The Muppets (2015)

The 2015 TV series The Muppets was especially open about Muppet sexuality and desire.

• Fozzie Bear is dating a human woman named Becky in the presentation pilot. When she tells her parents about their relationship, she's surprised at their reaction. Her mother agrees that they're "all into" saving the wildlife, "not being intimate with it."

• In a series of promos for the series, Nathan Fillion and Miss Piggy show general interest in one another, culminating in Kermit spotting him making the "walk of shame" early one morning from Piggy's trailer.

• In the episode "Pig Girls Don't Cry", Sam the Eagle objects to using the word "gesticulate" which means to move your hands, which leads to shaking hands, which is the first step in making babies.

• In the same episode, Kermit described his relationship with Denise stating: "we were at a cross-promotional synergy meeting and we ended up, uh... cross-promoting."

• Later in the same episode, it is explained that Animal can't tour anymore because life on the road is no good for him. Animal laments the fact stating "Too many women. Too many towns."

• Kermit reveals in "Hostile Makeover" that when he and Piggy were dating, they had a "free pass" list that couples have, stating which celebrity they'd let their significant other have sex with if the opportunity presented itself. Kermit says it was mostly for fun, unless he found himself alone in an elevator someday with Lea Thompson. Later in the episode, he finds himself in that exact situation, until Gonzo comes into the elevator just as the doors are closing and ruins the moment.

• The same episode involves a plot in which Piggy finds herself in a "code green" great mood after falling for Josh Groban. She says it's hard to get out of bed these days because, as The Swedish Chef puts it, she's been "gropin' the Groban."

• Miss Piggy says that the tagline for a commercial she did in Japan was "Sex it to me, Sake boys" in "Bear Left Then Bear Write."

• Following Miss Piggy's wardrobe malfunction in "A Tail of Two Piggies," concerns about the show's dignity come into question. Speaking of Piggy's bare tail, Sam the Eagle asks Kermit if he's seen it. Kermit brazenly responds, "Well, I believe you know the answer to that question."

• Convinced that he can't persuade Yolanda to subscribe to "Team Love" in "Because... Love," Rizzo tells the camera that he'd settle for getting her on Team "Friends with Benefits," a phrase used to describe a non-romantic relationship in which each party agrees to sex without romantic attachment.

See also

• Boob jokes
• Nether regions
• Naked Muppets
• LGBT culture
• Are Ernie and Bert gay?
• Storks carrying babies

External links

• "A Brief History Of Muppets And Humans Having Weirdly Sexual Relationships" by Josh Kurp, Uproxx, October 14, 2015