The Muppets

The Muppets

If you were a kid growing up in the mid-to-late ‘70s, it was a very different world from the one we know today.  Doctor Who was actually still scary enough to make you hide behind the sofa, Texans took longer to chew, porn grew in hedges and Big Daddy and Giant Haystacks were athletes. 

Saturday nights were special.  You’d leap from your bath, hair still wet, jump into your bunny suit (Remember bunny suits?  Bunny suits were snuggly!) and be sat in front of the goggle box, sometimes pressed against the screen in anticipation, just in time for the opening bars of The Greatest TV Show Ever Madeä, The Muppet Show. That’s right, the Muppets!  Screw you, Guardian-reading Wire fans!  The Muppet Show is the best show that’s ever been on telly! 

Watched at its height by an estimated audience of 235 million people in over 100 countries and spawning nine movies, The Muppet Show was wild, crazy, frenetic fun for the whole family, a surrealistic variety show full of acid-trip sketches and Andy Hardy-style “Hey kids, let’s put on a show,” pluck.  Every week, despite Kermit the Frog’s best efforts, the programme would degenerate into chaos, the motley cast of felt animals, monsters and humans spreading anarchy.  The biggest stars in the world clamoured to be guest stars.  Johnny Cash sang Jackson with Miss Piggy, Elton John sang Crocodile Rock with puppet crocodiles...Debbie Harry sang The Rainbow Connection with Kermit!  It gave us a porcine diva, singing chickens, mad scientists, an unintelligible Swedish chef, a homicidal drummer, Mah Nà Mah Na (Ok, it was in an Italian soft porn movie first but where did you hear it?) and Piiiiiigs…iiiin…Spaaaaaaace!

It’s been 12 long years though since the last theatrical Muppet movie, the dire Muppets From Space.  Sure, in the years since, there’ve been TV movies and specials starring minor R’n’B stars, the deputy from the Scream movies and Whoopi Goldberg but let’s face it; who, other than my girlfriend, ever deliberately watched The Muppets’ Wizard Of Oz?  Well, guess what folks? It's time to play the music…It's time to light the lights…

Growing up in Smalltown USA with his human brother Gary (played by human Muppet, Jason Segal), Muppet Walter dreams of meeting his heroes from the Muppet Show.  When Gary and girlfriend Mary (Amy Adams) head off on vacation to Los Angeles to celebrate their tenth anniversary, Walter tags along.  Visiting the now derelict Muppet Studios, he uncovers a plot by evil Texas oil baron Tex Richman (Chris Cooper) to tear down the studios and drill for oil beneath the Muppet Theatre.  But there’s a clause in the contract; if the Muppets can raise $10million, they can buy back the studios and thwart Richman’s evil plan.  With the help of Gary and Mary, it’s up to Walter to track down and reunite the Muppets for one last show…

Eschewing the adaptations of the last few Muppet movies (The Muppet Christmas Carol, Muppet Treasure Island), and written by lifelong Muppet fans and Frat Packers Jason Segel and Nicholas Stoller, this reboot sticks pretty close to the classic Muppet formula of cheerful anarchy, slapstick, sentimentalism and gags.  Fast-paced and frenetic, with celeb cameos from Mickey Rooney through to Jack Black (my favourite being Foo Fighter Dave Grohl as an Animal impersonator), The Muppets takes itself just seriously enough and manages to be knowing and post-modern without being cynical.  The plot, such as it is, has Walter, Gary and Mary inspiring a reclusive Kermit to get the Muppets back together for a fundraising telethon; a task that isn’t as easy as it sounds.  The Great Gonzo has now married Camilla the chicken and gone into the plumbing supplies business, selling toilets, Animal is in court-ordered anger management, forbidden from playing the drums, Fozzie is a down-and-out lounge act in Reno and Miss Piggy is now the editor of French Vogue (Emily Blunt reprising her icy assistant role from The Devil Wears Prada).  The acts are still as shambolic and self-deluded as ever, Waldorf and Statler are still heckling from their box, fourth walls are smashed and gleeful mayhem ensues.    

But are the Muppets still relevant today?  Whether they ever were might have been a better question.  Blagging themselves a meeting with a TV studio executive (Rashida Jones) they want to pitch their idea for a telethon to, there’s a moment that neatly encapsulates the streak of wistful melancholy that runs through The Muppets when she tells our heroes, “I remember you guys from when I was a kid.  I’m gonna shoot straight: you guys aren’t famous anymore,” prompting the wise-cracking Fozzie Bear to remark: “I wish she’d shot a little more curvy.” 

The appeal of the Muppets has always been that they’re out of step with reality.  They always were a throwback to a bygone era of music hall variety, a collision between surrealism and vaudeville, their values and morality just that little bit better than ours.  Showing them an episode of the latest hit kids TV show, an exercise in happy slapping titled Punch Teacher where kids…punch teachers, Kermit comments “I think kids are better and smarter than this,” and that’s always been the point of the Muppets.  The Muppet Show, for all its anarchic mentalness was always a show made by a bunch of idealistic hippies who hadn’t yet lost faith in the future and Segal and Stoller have pinned their hearts to their sleeves and given us a smart, funny film aimed squarely at lovers, dreamers and you.  It’s the Muppet movie we’ve all been waiting for and honours the memory of Jim Henson. 

And I guarantee, this time next week, you’ll still be clucking Camilla the chicken’s version of Cee Lo Green’s F**k You!

David Watson

Director

James Bobin

Writers

Jason Segel & Nicholas Stoller based on characters created by Jim Henson

Cast

Jason Segel, Amy Adams, Chris Cooper, Rashida Jones, Kermit, Miss Piggy, Gonzo, Fozzie Bear, Scooter, Dr. Bunsen Honeydew, Beaker, Animal, Dr Teeth and the Electric Mayhem

Country

USA

Running time

109 minutes

Year

2011

Certificate

U