Monster Performers[]
Is the backstage photo enough to suggest that Sweetums, Thog, and Timmy Monster were performed by Louise Gold, Jim Henson, and Dave Goelz in "Take a Little One Step"? If so, why wouldn't Richard Hunt and Jerry Nelson have performed Sweetums and Thog? At this point, they were almost exclusively those characters' performers. -- Peter (talk) 15:13, 31 August 2007 (UTC)
- I have also wondered this myself. I think it's more likely that Jerry Nelson wouldn't have performed Thog than that Richard Hunt wouldn't have performed Sweetums (even if he didn't speak). And besides, in the backstage scene preceding the number, Jim Henson performed Kermit, not any of the monsters (and Jerry Nelson performed Robin, not Thog). --Minor muppetz 03:13, 1 September 2007 (UTC)
- I wonder if it's different when they're dancing, and not speaking? Also, had to mention that it tickles me that I edited the page merely to add a possessive apostrophe to "Bernadette Peters' dressing room." Aren't you glad to have an English teacher hanging around the wiki? :) Max riverbottom
- My guess is it could depend on how complex the choreography given to the particular character is. After all we know there were occassions on the show where one puppeteer might perform another's character because whatever was required of the character for that particular piece was better suited to someone else's skills (such as when Frank Oz puppeteered Annie Sue in Carbon Paper in the Leo Sayer epiosde). Anyway, I have just watched this episode (Bernadette Peters), and I watched it before reading the entry on the wiki, so I didn't know about any of the questionmakrs concenring. Watching one thing that struck me was Sweetums's dancing in this particular number it seemed to me to be unusually good, so much so that for a moment I thought "It's almost like they've gotten a trained dancer to do this monster, but it's Sweetums they wouldn't have". Now we know Richard could move pretty well. But the question I would ask is Did he have much if any formal dance training? or was he just naturally a good mover? I ask this because we know that Louise does have a fair amount of dance training (her stage school education). Emma 22:57, March 19, 2010 (UTC)
- I've just dug out Look-in Junior TV Times for 16 December 1978 (I have that one and also the November 1978 one). Anyway in Richard Tippett's interview with Louise Gold (who was then their newest performer) it says Louise herself "takes hold" of other characters in the series. "I do the lady in the jug band and one of the big monsters - Big Mamma - plus various other chickens and monsters. General dogsbody stuff." - The interesting fact is that in this quote she specifically mentions sometimes performing other monsters, could this be evidence that supports the backstage photo's sugguestion of her doing Sweetums in that numbber? Emma 23:04, March 22, 2010 (UTC)
- My guess is it could depend on how complex the choreography given to the particular character is. After all we know there were occassions on the show where one puppeteer might perform another's character because whatever was required of the character for that particular piece was better suited to someone else's skills (such as when Frank Oz puppeteered Annie Sue in Carbon Paper in the Leo Sayer epiosde). Anyway, I have just watched this episode (Bernadette Peters), and I watched it before reading the entry on the wiki, so I didn't know about any of the questionmakrs concenring. Watching one thing that struck me was Sweetums's dancing in this particular number it seemed to me to be unusually good, so much so that for a moment I thought "It's almost like they've gotten a trained dancer to do this monster, but it's Sweetums they wouldn't have". Now we know Richard could move pretty well. But the question I would ask is Did he have much if any formal dance training? or was he just naturally a good mover? I ask this because we know that Louise does have a fair amount of dance training (her stage school education). Emma 22:57, March 19, 2010 (UTC)
- I wonder if it's different when they're dancing, and not speaking? Also, had to mention that it tickles me that I edited the page merely to add a possessive apostrophe to "Bernadette Peters' dressing room." Aren't you glad to have an English teacher hanging around the wiki? :) Max riverbottom