(courtesy Muppet Wiki / (c) The Jim Henson Company / Disney)
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The illusions that have baffled me for years is when muppets go outside when they seem to break free from their puppeteers and become little sentient creatures….These movies were released before CGI was ubiquitous. These are in-camera effects. What you see is what they shot, so how did they do it? How does a Muppet sit on a bench, drive, bike, walk or cross the street? (Alex Boucher / courtesy Laughing Squid)
In most cases, peeking behind the curtains of any TV show or movie can really ruin the magic.
After all, we want to believe that the characters we are watching and worlds we are immersed in are as real as the world around us (unless, you think you’re in The Matrix, in which case, well, maybe not so much).
But somehow when it comes to the Muppets, because we know they have humans bringing them to life, seeing how they can make characters we love like Kermit (Jim Henson) and Fozzie Bear (Frank Oz) actually how wonderful they are because how real they feel seems even more pronounced, and dare I say it, magical.
Movie essayist Alex Boucher does a beautiful job in this mini-documentary of showing how the Muppets’ creator Jim Henson and his extraordinarily talented team did their thing and why it is wondrously good, even with the curtain pulled way back.
Watch and enjoy and marvel at how lucky we are to have (and to have had) people this talented in the world alongside us.