“A Muppet Family Christmas”

“So as I sit here watching A Muppet Family Christmas for the second time this season (the second of many, many more viewings!), I realized that I’d love to hear more about your experiences on that project.  A Muppet Family Christmas is one of my all-time favorite Henson productions, and it’s just not Christmas without it.  In particular, I love the interaction between Gonzo and the Turkey which still makes me laugh out loud some 30-odd years and hundreds of viewings later!  You seem to have had a pretty strong friendship/chemistry with Dave Goelz by that point in time – any favorite memories there?  Between Gonzo/Turkey, and Gonzo/Rizzo in Muppet Christmas Carol, I do a lot of belly laughing during the holidays :-)” – Emily Kulaga

I am truly touched and amazed by the amount of people who speak to me about this television special from way back in 1987.  It stands as a true example of a Jim Henson Muppet special, a coming together of multiple character franchises all owned by Jim at the time, and too soon to be scattered to multiple corporate owners in the years following his death just three short years later.

But not only did this show bring together different Jim Henson character groups.  It brought together performers, producers, directors, and crew members from many different bodies of work, as well.

Though many specifics have faded in my memory over the last 33 years, there are some very strong remembrances of shooting this particular show.  One that is not so strong is precisely where we shot it…Toronto is easy to remember because we did so much work there during the 1980’s, but I had to confirm the studio with my longtime friend and producer, Larry Mirkin.  

Larry, of course, worked on “Fraggle Rock”,  “The Christmas Toy”, and “The Jim Henson Hour”, and though he didn’t work on “A Muppet Family Christmas” he did visit the set, so was able to confirm what I thought: that we shot this at CFTO, a studio in Agincourt near Toronto.  Thanks, Larry!

Honestly, there is very little that stands out in my memories about performing Gonzo’s antagonistic turkey who I believe was called Tom Turkey in the room.  At that stage after the Fraggle years, Dave and I had developed an amazing chemistry between us.  We were like an old married couple who could look at each other and intuit what the other was thinking and often about to say.

 

Our sense of each other’s timing was virtually telepathic, and it translated off-screen to going out for Indian meals at “Chandni Chowk” on Gerrard Street.  We spent a lot of time eating a lot of food there.  As I was getting familiar with the names of the Indian dishes shortly after Dave introduced me to the South Indian vegetarian cuisine, I infamously stepped up to the counter and proudly ordered “GA-LOOB JA-MOON” for dessert.  Behind the counter, a young Indian girl about my age snickered and went to get the dessert, but Dave belly-laughed at my mispronunciation of ‘gulab jamun’.

 

Also on hand for this coming together of the franchises was Gerry Parkes who I had, by now, worked with extensively as Sprocket to his “Doc” on “Fraggle Rock”.  Though our relationship had centered around being in the studio together it was quite solid and he and I had also developed a strong bond and chemistry.  Gerry was an amazing actor who carried the weight of conveying to the audience both his dialogue and clarity as to what Sprocket was attempting to convey.  I used to say he delivered both sides of the scene as Sprocket spoke ‘dog’.

Probably my most cherished memory from that special was a moment between Rizzo the Rat and Oscar the Grouch.  The moment brings up deep emotion about how excited I was to be working with Caroll Spinney, who was responsible for my being noticed by Jim almost a decade earlier.

Even though it was Caroll and Debi Spinney who brought me to Jim I had never worked with Caroll on a set because he was on Sesame Street and Jim had me doing everything else.  When Oscar says, “I never had a rat in my trash can before”, it was true of he and I having never worked on the same show before.  

Over the years Jim celebrated our times together as an appreciator of the present moment.  He seemed to treasure birthdays, and holidays like Christmas and Thanksgiving with his family of choice.  I think that’s why we did so many holiday specials!  My wife, Melissa, used to joke that she always knew we would never be home on my birthday because since it was Jim’s birthday, too, some project would bring us all to the same city so that everybody would be together.

“A Muppet Family Christmas” was done during a golden time within our little sangha.  Everything felt warm and comfortable and uncomplicated with Jim at the helm, Jerry Juhl overseeing the script, and Peter Harris (from our “Muppet Show” days) directing, a time when the Muppets were still the Muppets.  Looking back, I think of Jim as just entering a new phase in his life at 50 years old, on the verge of elderly, still with plenty of energy and a mature creative drive, and looking more and more for collaborative input from the people with whom he had trusted to surround himself.

That same year, he had begun gently prodding me for ideas, and about directing and producing, something I had not given serious thought to doing.  Jim had a way of seeing people’s capacity sometimes before they sensed it, themselves.  Things would be very different if he had survived to today, or even for a few more years.

Probably the most touching part of the show for me is Kermit and Robin meeting the Fraggles.  I think it’s because of the truth within the dialogue and the depth of spirit within the subtext of the Fraggles meeting Kermit who was actually their ancient ancestor, of sorts.  

Also, note the lengths that were taken to uphold the Fraggle’s innocent sensibility.  They were not treated as ‘another puppet franchise’ who just popped into Ma Bear’s living room unexplained to sing a song.  Their ‘world’, the integrity of their perspective, their relationship to what they only knew as “outer space”, was kept entirely intact rather than ignored or exploited.  Jim and Jerry Juhl cared about that, those details that give the Muppets their depth, and therefore, their connection to the audience, a respect for the characters, themselves, that has largely deteriorated out of existence. 

There was ‘right thinking’ about how to do what was best for the characters despite the tongue-in-cheek nature of this show which did, in fact, poke fun at mixing together the different sensibilities of the different Muppet families.  Doc with Ernie & Bert, Sprocket barking a ‘conversation’ with Rowlf, the Swedish Chef plotting to cook Big Bird, and even one of my all time dearest moments, the ending of the show where Jim and Sprocket are in the kitchen doing the dishes. 

I can still feel what it felt like to have been standing there that day below Jim.  In that scene, Jim says that he ‘loves it when they have a good time’…no truer words were ever spoken.  We all had so many good times together, and Jim loved it.

Have a safe and happy holiday, everybody!

-S

OH! – and you can see “A Muppet Family Christmas” HERE