Free Memoirs of a Muppets Writer: (You mean somebody actually writes that stuff?) by Mr. Joseph A. Bailey Page A

camera.
    Jim wanted his puppets to be able to gesture and handle props, which most hand puppets of the Punch and Judy variety could not do. So, Jim designed “handed” puppets. Fozzie Bear, Ernie, Oscar the Grouch, the Swedish Chef and Rowlf, the piano playing dog, are “handed” puppets. They have sleeves and gloves which become the puppet’s arms and hands.
    Usually, the puppeteer puts his right hand into the puppet’s head and his left hand into the sleeve and glove. Since the puppeteers are right-handed, “handed” Muppets are all left-handed. The right, or “dead” arm is usually pinned into a permanent position and played away from the camera.
    It really gets tricky when the puppet needs to use two hands. When that happens, a second puppeteer is recruited. He or she stands behind the lead puppeteer and slips his or her hand into the puppet’s right hand. So, when you see Ernie butter toast, or deal cards, know that each hand is played by a separate puppeteer. The exceptions are the Swedish Chef and Rowlf, the piano playing dog. Both of their hands were “played” by Frank Oz.
    The puppets without hands, Kermit: Gonzo; Piggy; and Bert, for example, are called “rod” puppets because their arms are controlled by thin rods, painted to match the scene’s background. For these guys to handle props requires the use of television technology.
    Let’s say, Kermit has to answer a phone back stage at the Muppet Theater. This requires a series of steps. Firstly, when the phone rings, Kermit goes over to the phone and puts his hand on the receiver. Then we stop video taping. Kermit’s hand is attached to the receiver and the rod is then removed from his arm and attached to the bottom of the receiver. Then, we resume taping from another angle, say a close up on the phone. The shot widens out as Kermit brings the phone to his ear and the scene continues. When the two shots are spliced together, Kermit will seamlessly answer the phone. The sequence is reversed when Kermit hangs up the phone.
    The final piece of the Muppet’s success is the television puppeteering technique Jim Henson created for them. Since television, as I said, is a close-up medium, Jim determined that eye contact between puppet and audience was essential. It’s the basic reason Muppets appear to be so alive.
    Jim accomplished this by having TV monitors around the set so the puppeteers could watch their performances as they were recorded. When a puppet looks the puppeteer in the eye on the monitor, he or she knows that their puppet is looking the viewing audience directly in the eye.
    Additionally, Jim discovered that puppets with fixed expressions could appear to change those expressions by changing the angle at which a puppet’s head is presented to the camera. For example, Ernie has a permanent happy grin. To make him look baleful or sad, Jim would tilt Ernie’s head forward, hiding the mouth and presenting only the eyes to camera. To make Ernie seem to grin, Jim would turn his head slightly sideways.
    The most difficult physical aspect of Muppet puppeteering is hand control. Make the “duck head” again with your hand. Then make it go, “quack, quack, quack,” very slowly. Notice that your four fingers go up and your thumb goes down. That’s the natural movement of the human hand.
    However, If you do this with your hand in a puppet, the head will bounce up and down, losing eye contact as well as the illusion that the puppet is alive. When people talk, the jaw moves but the head and the eyes remains steady.
    Puppeteers in training work on “talking” with their right hand, moving only the thumb. This is usually done with a puppet, in front of a mirror, reciting the alphabet. The object is to move the puppet’s jaw while keeping the head stationary. Try it. Make your “duck head” recite the alphabet moving only your thumb. Not as easy as you thought, is it?
    Understanding this Muppet technology is essential to writing for them. It