Puppet Up!
Happy pre-Thanksgiving to all. My circle of friends has had quite a series of triumphs and travails of late. As the year winds down, I hope things start quieting down so people can get back to the difficult business of living.
But that's not what I'm here to talk about.
The last several years have seen some bad puppet television. Crank Yankers for example, which combined prank phone calls with puppetry and projectile vomiting. Hilarity occasionally ensued, but it was usually hard to watch an entire half hour of the stuff. More recently, Nickolodeon has introduced Mister Meaty. To be fair, I've hardly watched 10 minutes of that program, so I won't try to judge its overall quality. However, it was immediately apparent that the puppeteering and the puppets themselves lacked a certain finesse. Where do you go to for puppets with finesse, with substance, with style? The Jim Henson Company, of course.
I was lucky enough to catch the latest episode of Henson's own Puppet Up-- okay, actually dirkdada recorded it for me. It's a brilliant concept, very difficult to realize, but well-executed in spite of that fact. Puppet improv, in front of a live audience, completely uncensored, save for the occasional bleep. While it's not a perfect show, I can feel some very solid potential. It has a kind of early "Who's Line" feel to it, and the puppets, absolutely filled with personality, are always entertaining. At its best, it's almost like an improvised cartoon. There's nothing funnier than seeing cute-as-hell puppets sing an improvised opera about the pros and cons of artificial breasts. See them live, or see them on TV, but see them. If this becomes a regular thing, it will only get funnier.
But that's not what I'm here to talk about.
The last several years have seen some bad puppet television. Crank Yankers for example, which combined prank phone calls with puppetry and projectile vomiting. Hilarity occasionally ensued, but it was usually hard to watch an entire half hour of the stuff. More recently, Nickolodeon has introduced Mister Meaty. To be fair, I've hardly watched 10 minutes of that program, so I won't try to judge its overall quality. However, it was immediately apparent that the puppeteering and the puppets themselves lacked a certain finesse. Where do you go to for puppets with finesse, with substance, with style? The Jim Henson Company, of course.
I was lucky enough to catch the latest episode of Henson's own Puppet Up-- okay, actually dirkdada recorded it for me. It's a brilliant concept, very difficult to realize, but well-executed in spite of that fact. Puppet improv, in front of a live audience, completely uncensored, save for the occasional bleep. While it's not a perfect show, I can feel some very solid potential. It has a kind of early "Who's Line" feel to it, and the puppets, absolutely filled with personality, are always entertaining. At its best, it's almost like an improvised cartoon. There's nothing funnier than seeing cute-as-hell puppets sing an improvised opera about the pros and cons of artificial breasts. See them live, or see them on TV, but see them. If this becomes a regular thing, it will only get funnier.