As much of a Star Wars fan as I am, most of you know that I’m equally passionate about those soulful yet silly surrogates, The Muppets. It makes sense, since both Star Wars and The Muppets imprinted on me at the same time, in the late 70’s, when I was a young, impressionable child. Both instilled in me a sense of wonder, imagination, and humor, and thanks to Jim Henson’s partner Frank Oz (neé Oznowicz, whose parents fled the Netherlands after helping fight the Nazis), both Yoda and Fozzie Bear had an outsize influence on my approach to life. But we would never even have the Muppet Show if it wasn’t for Louis Winogradsky, a Jewish refugee whose parents fled the Russian pogroms when he was 5 years old.
After two failed pilots and a disastrous turn on the original 1975 SNL, Jim Henson was struggling to find a home for his Muppets. All the major networks had passed on The Muppet Show, but thankfully Winogradsky, who had become the highly successful British media mogul Lord Lew Grade, gave Jim Henson and his merry band a shot at success, offering to financially back the production of The Muppet Show in exchange for it taping in London. The rest, as they say, is history (or Herstory, as another Frank Oz character, Miss Piggy, might insist). The Muppet Show’s Jewish DNA runs deep. Modeled after borscht belt/vaudeville variety shows (Frank Oz modeled Fozzie Bear after a typical borscht belt comedian), the very first guest was Jewish theater legend (and Yiddish Fiddler producer) Joel Grey, followed by a string of iconic Jewish guests stars such as George Burns, Milton Berle, Madeline Kahn, Zero Mostel, Danny Kaye, Gilda Radner, Alan Arkin, and Paul Simon. There was also the time when Fozzie, trying to impress magician Doug Henning, accidentally pulled a Rabbi out of his hat…
The original show spawned numerous classic movies, endless merchandise, and also a series of lesser-regarded spinoffs following the tragic death of Jim Henson in 1990, and the sale of his IP to Disney. But I am ecstatic to report that, although it may have taken fifty years, thanks to another Jewish Hollywood mogul (the goofy yet influential product of Jewish day school, actor and producer Seth Rogen), the original Muppet Show has finally returned to network TV, with a new special that aired last week to critical acclaim. It will hopefully serve as a backdoor pilot for a brand-new season of Muppet mania that will inspire a whole new generation of children with its gleefully zany, yet also poignantly hopeful outlook on life. I will be right there with them, watching, as I continue to build rainbow connections filled with sweetness, community, and not a small dash of silliness.
Cantor Eric Schulmiller
