Where's Telly?
Anyone notice that just ablout all of the characters from the shows are there, except (most noticibly) Telly from Sesame Street? Anyone know why?
sharei think telly showed up a couple of years after this movie was made
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MovieChat Forums > A Muppet Family Christmas (1987) Discussion > Where's Telly?
well, you can't really trust wikipedia, but wikipedia says that Telly debuted in 1979. Elmo (or a muppet that looks like him) was in this special, but not named (he was in the little play they do with some characters).
I watched it today and saw Telly in the background...
shareI don't think he's in it. He should have been because: he was in Follow That Bird (made in '85), and wasn't he a major character back then too? Is Marty Robinson even credited on the special? I'll have to watch it again and make sure, if anyone could find him please let me know. I just wanted to say Happy Holidays to everyone who's on here and I hope you have an awesome season! P:-}
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Telly isn't in this special, but he was around before then. He debuted on Sesame Street in 1979. Wikipedia may be hard to believe, but Muppet Wiki can normally be trusted, and even if it can't, Telly appeared in many productions before A Muppet Family Christmas came out, including Big Bird in China, Don't Eat the Pictures, Follow That Bird, Learning About Letters, Bedtime Stories and Songs, and many Sesame Street episodes, as well as being in the background in the earlier Muppets Take Manhattan and The Muppets: A Celebration of 30 Years.
Telly isn't the only major character missing in this special. Also missing are Mr. Snuffleupagus, Mr. Johnson, most of Little Jerry and the Monotones (only Big Jeffy is present), Bruno, Don Music, Placedo Flamingo, Gladys the Cow, Chris and the Alphabeats, Clementine, and Hoots the Owl. Major characters from The Muppet Show who don't appear include Sweetums and Dr. Strangepork.
I didn't notice Telly in this special but saw Elmo sitting on the stairs in the background when Fozzie starts the comedy routine with the snowman. And I was lamenting the absence of Sweetums with my girlfriend earlier today, he should have been in the truck with those guys (maybe just chasing a la the Muppet Movie). There is a fat blue guy, similar to Mr. Johnson there. Gladys is definitely there as she sings an operatic line in the final carol, right after Scooter who is hardly in it. The other guys, well.... I'm truly partial to the Alphabeats (especially Chris with his weird little mouth) but the excuse in the back of my mind is that they only had so many puppeteers AND screen space.
Ps: As Jerry Nelson is doing Robin when they are in Fraggle Rock, I wonder who is holding Gobo like a dead fish? I hope not Carrol Spinney as I have always wondered what he would be like with some of the more "normal" puppets. And when Animal says that Cookie Monster is "his kinda fella"... crunch munch ... what dat mean?
Blah blah, I've become a muppet freak.
Yentel i think its because he likes to chew things like animal does. Animal likes to eat also. Remember Eat drums! No No No animail beat drums!
shareIt may have been when Telly was just a minor character, plus, if they added every single muppet from Sesame Street, they probably wouldn't have room to move around the sets. I believe that's why you see Elmo in the background sitting on the stairs and not saying anything. It was probably a few years before Kevin Clash took over when Richard Hunt was still puppeteering Elmo.
If it's been fifteen years or more, it's no longer a spoiler.