Honest to goodness, I woke up the other night from a sound sleep and this was going through my head:
I really loved that show as a kid. Although I was a fan of the Electric Company, too.
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Come for the politics, stay for the snark.
Quote tweet friends, screenshot enemies.
Weird. Rome has an American Pope and America has a Russian President.
I swear, each month of 2025 will have its own history degree.
Trump should be leading, not lying.
The Supreme Court cannot be allowed to become the ultimate, unaccountable arbiter of everything.
Republicans do not pay their debts.
Their boy Ron is an empty plastic cup that will never know pudding.
Our messy unity will be our strength.
Russian mouthpiece, go fuck yourself.
When tyranny becomes law, rebellion becomes duty. ~Thomas Jefferson
Never entrust democracy to any process that requires Republicans to act in good faith.
Do we throw up our hands or do we roll up our sleeves? (hint, door #2)
If America since Jan 2025 hasn’t broken your heart, you haven’t loved her enough.
“What are Republicans afraid of?” Everything.
Conservatism: there are people the law protects but does not bind and others who the law binds but does not protect.
Museums are not America’s attic for its racist shit.
Do not shrug your shoulders and accept the normalization of untruths.
Celebrate the fucking wins.
There are no moderate republicans – only extremists and cowards.
People are weird.
Historically it was a little unusual for the president to be an incoherent babbling moron.
Give the craziest people you know everything they want and hope they don’t ask for more? Great plan.
Let’s delete this post and never speak of this again.
Anyone who bans teaching American history has no right to shape America’s future.
Teri
Loved the electric company. It had morgan freeman didn’t it? How about ZOOM!
Tom
The live-action spiderman show on electric company was pretty much the best thing ever.
The Dangerman
Never into Sesame Street, but I watched Electric Company. My introduction to Morgan Freeman…
…plus, the Oriental Chick on the show was kinda hot (although I was just a little to young to really appreciate her).
Thanks, now this is playing through MY head:
“Jelly belly, nice and fat…”
Was that on Electric Company or did I do too many hits in graduate school?
abject funk
What did they scream at the beginning of Electric Company?
oobeewabbakenoowwa is what I remember.
Anyone watch 321 Contact (with the awesome Bloodhound Gang)?
J.W. Hamner
TOO!? Your lack of enthusiastic support for the total HAWESOME that was the Electric Company calls into question your entire value system.
slag
Gotta go with Electric Co and 3-2-1. Sesame Street was a slightly distant third. But yes, the theme song is great.
DFS
There’s a vast amount of Sesame Street on the YouTube, and it’s really something to check out the older material.
Richard Pryor did a couple bits for the show that go well beyond the border of the surreal.
danimal
For the haters.
srv
My Sesame Street Superstition is better than your dreams.
The Dangerman
@The Dangerman:
And, too my surprise, has had a pretty good career.
Omnes Omnibus
@Teri: I had a big coffee table book sized Zoom book with the songs and activities.
Jim, Once
As a young parent, what I loved most about Electric Co. was that it operated on two levels – one for the kids, and one definitely for the parents. I watched that show every day with my kids – and they and I laughed at different times.
TheOtherWA
My sister found the original Sesame Street episodes from 1969 on dvd and bought them for her daughter, and I watched one with her. I had forgotten what the original looked like it was so long ago. (Yes I’m in my 40’s, don’t bother doing the math.)
Other than the production values, it held up well. Don’t think they had much of a budget back then.
Electric Co. was great too. You could never have made me choose between them.
tesslibrarian
The 70s episodes of Sesame Street are available on dvd (their “Old School” collection), with a disclaimer that they are “For Entertainment Purposes” now. Sigh.
And, oh…Electric Company! Whenever I see Morgan Freeman I think of my 3rd grade homeroom, where they’d show it before school started in the morning. That was back when my kindergarten-aged sister and I would walk to school. Alone. It’s a wonder my sister and I survived. (/roll eyes)
ETA: This song will get stuck in your head for awhile, but is worth it.
S. cerevisiae
I still remember some of the Mad version of the Sesame Street lyrics:
“Crummy day, smoggy skies
charcoal gray…”
it was called Reality Street.
I was a twisted kid.
ogliberal
I watched the Macy’s T-Day parade with the kids the other day and what amazes me re: Sesame Street is that the same folks I watched as a young kid – Bob, Gordon, Maria, Susan, Luis – still ride on the Sesame Street float during the parade. Gordon is about the only one you see regularly on the show these days but the other four show up every once in a while. (Bob is like 100-years-old) The format has changed – they record a lot fewer shows per year, focus much more on the Muppets and 15 minutes is set aside for “Elmo’s World”. (I used to hate Elmo but have developed a respect for him – after being forced to watch him because of the kids I’ve noticed a lot of adult focused jokes – in typical Muppet fashion – coming from him.)
The original Electric Company cast was fantastic. The new Electric Company is pretty terrible and almost nothing like the original.
Do yourselves a favor and get the Sesame Street Christmas special from 1978 on DVD. I think I enjoy it more than the kids. It’s the cast I grew up with, including Mr. Hooper and Linda, the deaf woman. I recently took the kids to Sesame Place – they opened the park for the T-Day weekend – and the characters performed “Keep Christmas With You”, complete with sign-language. And NYCers will love the subway scenes, featuring old school cars, turnstiles, and token booths. (with an actual person selling tokens through a metal grate!)
freelancer
Wow, this AZ/ ASU game is ridiculous.
Yutsano
@ogliberal:
Does it help you to know the voice/puppeteer behind Elmo is a 6’4″ black guy who is also a classically trained actor? I can’t find it now but he told the story of how he had to explain he was Elmo to his son and his son didn’t believe him. It’s pretty classic.
Sirkowski
There’s a great version of the Sesame Street theme from the Free Design.
ogliberal
@Yutsano: Knew that and he’s a pretty funny guy. I’ve seen him ad-lib – both as Kevin Clash and as Elmo – during interviews and he’s pretty darned good. He actually has a pretty deep voice – I originally thought Elmo’s puppeteer was a woman.
kdaug
HEY YOU GUYS!!!
Awsomes.
Anyone watch “Villa Alegre” back in the 70s, or was that just a Texas thing? (Wouldn’t surprise me – Dallas PBS was also the first to bring Monty Python/Flowery Twats/Benny Hill/et. al. to the US. Surprisingly progressive for the times).
Also, “Big Blue Marble”? Anyone?
srv
@kdaug: KERA for the win.
Miss the Goodies too.
ogliberal
@kdaug: La, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la – Villa Allegre!
We used to get that one reguarly here on the NYC PBS stations. Probably because of the huge Puerto Rican/Cuban population in the area. Between that show and Sesame Street I had no problem counting to 10 in Spanish and knew a number of other Spanish words as well. What I liked about the show was that the characters would have conversations with one speaking entirely in English and other speaking entirely in Spanish…and they’d converse as if they were both speaking the same language.
Goodbye. Amigo. The show is over. We’ll see you…later. On Villa Allegre.
SIA
It could be worse. I had a nightmare repeating circuit in my brain for a couple days of…“B-I-N-G-O! B-I-N-G-O! B-I-N-G-O! And Bingo was his name – oh!”
Warning: viral ear worm
ogliberal
RE: Electric Company.
In addition to the hot asian chick, another member of the tweener/teen cast of the show was Irene Cara.
Jim, Once
@kdaug: Know OF Big Blue Marble, but was never able to watch. Monty Python, though . . . OMG. We watched any version of it we could find anywhere Back in the Day (early ’70s). When I returned from grad school in England, I used the phrase ‘me bum’ in quoting something an Englishman had said in conversation with me, and an American friend asked excitedly, “He really said that? Me bum? I though they only said that on Monty Python!” I started teaching shortly thereafter, and my students didn’t want to read Middlemarch or Austen – couldn’t we just watch Monty Python, please, please, please? (Sigh. I’ll leave now, said the Old Fart.)
ogliberal
How about the “Great Space Coaster” and “New Zoo Revue”? Both were pre-school (as in watch before going to school because they were on at the crack of dawn) favorites of mine. Coaster came much later than the Revue…I think it was an early 80s show. “Family Guy” did a great spoof of the Coaster’s opening. And I remember a great musical skit with the gorilla-like puppet character doing a version of “Don’t Fence Me In”. Also, Gary Gnu.
Also was a pretty relgious viewer of “Magic Garden” (hippie chicks with guitars and a Chuckle Patch…what’s not to like?) and “Joya’s Fun’s School”. (ran at the same time on different days) I believe these were NYC-based shows so not sure how much reach they had outside of the metro-area.
srv
KERA also had SCTV. Great era for comedy.
kdaug
@srv: I don’t remember the Goodies specifically, but yeah, KERA rocked ~1972.
The maternal unit insisted on us watching Channel 13 exclusively, and although there was some early morning cartoon cheating, it was strictly my big sister’s idea. Promise.
And it probably wasn’t the best strategy for inculcating her religious worldview once “Cosmos” and “Connections” came on…
Obla-di, obla-dah.
Jim, Once
@ogliberal:
That’s so cool. I’ve got to find out who he is. My nearly-three-year-old grandson loves Elmo more than life itself. He wakes up in the morning crying out his name, and we have to turn Netflix on immediately.
daveX99
I like to hit the YouTube for the classic Erie & Bert sketches. Pure vaudeville. Cheers me right up.
I love Bert.
ogliberal
@Jim, Once: When NYC’s PBS station was facing the expiration of their Python contract they aired a marathon of all of the episodes plus “Holy Grail”. My college roommate taped all of them on VHS and we used to watch them all the time. We became the annoying guys who quoted every line. Four of us would sit there watching the vids into the early morning hours and repeating every line, word-for-word, in unison. We thought we were hilarious but visitors to our suite probably thought we were complete idiots.
Drugs and alcohol definitely helped.
Paul
Hey you guys, let’s not forget Rita Moreno.
kdaug
@ogliberal: Oh, shit.
“The New Zoo Review – coming right at you! With Three delightful animals, they’re something-something-something…”
Man, this thread is firing off some synapses that should probably be left alone – I have real shit to be remembering.
Jim, Once
@ogliberal: So funny. I had students who could do the same. Your comment led me to Netflix, where I downloaded 45 shows of MP instantly. God, I love Netflix.
Jim, Once
@Paul: Rita, Rita. Absolutely the best thing about Electric Company. Remember the johdpurs and the horsewhip? She had way too much fun with that little whip.
kdaug
@ogliberal:
Know how I can tell you’re authentic?
That’s the exact number of La’s.
And you will still be hearing that damn song tomorrow morning.
ogliberal
@Jim, Once: Here’s an interview with Kevin Clash and Elmo:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IY_sl1R3KJQ
And here’s Elmo addressing the Katy Perry controversy:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E2QgvAuKqkg
Ross Hershberger
Open thread? Sounds good. Back from work. I was tricked into drinking two coffee mugs of espresso around 7:00 pm. Felt good for a while. Now I think I’ll go lie by the door so when this caffeine downer kills me they won’t have to drag my body so far.
Oh, woe.
Oh, and I heard Pelosi pulled a rather GOP-esque maneuver to get the MC tax cut passed. Good for her. The Repubs must be crimson with rage. Except Boehner, of course.
Jim, Once
@ogliberal: Thanks so much for these, og. The first interview was a delight, but I’m not sure I’ll show it to my little boy.
Judas Escargot
@kdaug:
We had both of those in Boston in the 70s. So it wasn’t just Texas.
“Big Blue Marble” used to be on Sunday mornings after the Lost in Space reruns.
And I am now infected by the Villa Allegre earworm.
Xenos
@Paul: On season of ‘The Muppet Show’ Rita Moreno also does a great ‘Fever’ backed up by Animal on the drums.
ogliberal
@kdaug: I’ve been hearing it in my head for 30+ years…it’s stuck there.
asiangrrlMN
@Teri: ZOOM ruled. That is all.
ogliberal
@Jim, Once: When he’s ready, here’s a great vid of Elmo interviewing “Mr. Kevin”. I showed this to my 4-year-old when he was 3 but he was still a bit too young to make the Mr. Kevin is Elmo connection.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9apLeHRzSMY
ogliberal
Great vid of The Muppets doing Bohemian Rhapsody:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tgbNymZ7vqY
Even has the mahna mahna muppets.
There may have been no better variety show than “The Muppet Show”. The Sesame Street characters were/are great but “The Muppet Show” was Henson’s true genius at work. (obviously, the vid above was made well beyond Henson’s death but his spirit’s there)
Cris
Let’s peek through the polka dot door.
R-Jud
@ogliberal: I’ve got an almost-two-year-old, and I’ve really enjoyed watching her take to the Muppets and old-school Sesame Street like a duck to water. She doesn’t speak really coherently yet, but this morning she went off on a long monologue punctuated by the very clear word “Kermit!”
As an added bonus, when she’s older, she’ll know who Madeline Kahn and Peter Sellers were. This can only be a good thing.
brendancalling
i loved sesame street, the electric company (which, in retrospect, was totally drug-fueled), and mr. rogers.
i also remember a spanish show, “villa allegre”.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A-38zuWpgB8
Janet
I had a Bosnian co-worker in this factory where I used to work. His excellent English came from watching Sesame Street as a child (with Serbo-Croatian subtitles.)
PurpleGirl
Factoid (of whatever value you give it)
Joan Ganz Cooney of Children’s Television Workshop, which founded Sesame Street, is married to Peter G. Peterson. Yes, that Peterson. Go figure.
gil mann
Yeah, the show was way too fun and cool so they brought in “child development experts” to fucking ruin it. It was great not being talked down to when I was a kid; shame nobody’ll ever have that experience again.
Anybody see Cookie Monster getting booed on “Colbert” for claiming cookies are a “sometimes food?” God, that was wonderful.
DPirate
143
Easy Reader was an inspiration!
DPirate
143
Easy Reader was an inspiration! Does anyone remember Kukla, Fran and Ollie?