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[0:08] Al Malafronte: Hello and welcome to the Break a Bat podcast where baseball meets Broadway, an attempt to show that my two favorite mediums don't have to live in such separate worlds and maybe even break some stigmas.

[0:20] Al Malafronte: We're happy to have you with us.

[0:22] Al Malafronte: Now let's play ball.

[0:25] Al Malafronte: Hello and welcome to Break a Bat. I'm your host, Al Malafronte, coming at you for the Broadway Podcast Network.

[0:31] Al Malafronte: Uh, this is a special show for me. Obviously, I'd like to think my passion for what I get to do on this podcast shines through in every chat that I have. But every once in a while we're joined by someone whose art and work has played a huge role in your life, and sometimes that goes all the way back to childhood.

[0:46] Al Malafronte: Uh for me personally, and I'm sure for many in our audience, my first introduction to both comedy and entertainment and even musical theater comes from the world of the Muppets. Um now, since this is a show where sports and entertainment kind of collide, I think it's important for everyone to know. I've talked in the past about how I'm the commissioner of my fantasy baseball league.

[1:03] Al Malafronte: Uh over the years, there's been a number of nicknames that I've tacked on to some friends who play in the league, uh, based on their personalities that mirror that kind of mirror various Muppets. I mean, the great Nico was inspired by the great Gonzo. Uh Rizzo the Rat is a name that CJ Oliveri has taken on. And even going back to my childhood, my Italian cousins Dino and Danny, a classic comedy team, they were always Bert and Ernie, and believe it or not, I still call them that all these years later, whether they like it or not.

[1:30] Al Malafronte: And uh, you know, the Muppets really inspired me to want to work in entertainment. When I was a junior in college, my first internship was at Kaufman Astoria Studios where Sesame Street was taped, and nothing short of a dream come true to be around some of the creatives. However, there were a few days that year, more so than others, that I really felt like I belonged. And that's very much thanks to our special guest tonight.

[1:50] Al Malafronte: Um, Cold March Day. Sesame was about to tape an episode called The Flood, and a legendary puppeteer was going to be on set to perform Ernie, my favorite character. And uh, while I know all you Muppet fans know him, uh that puppeteer just happens to be the great Steve Whitmire. And he treated me like gold. We talk shop, and you never know that my most important job that day was probably to grab someone's coffee.

[2:13] Al Malafronte: Uh tonight we're lucky enough to be joined by Steve, just to give you some background on him. He got his start as one of the lead puppeteers with Jim Henson on The Muppet Show in 1978, where he created another favorite of mine in Rizzo the Rat. Uh, he also worked on Fraggle Rock, The Dark Crystal, Labyrinth, all the major Muppet films. And after Jim Henson's passing in 1990, he was tapped as the man to succeed him as the performer of Kermit the Frog as well as Ernie, uh, roles that he performed incredibly up until the mid-2010s.

[2:40] Al Malafronte: And in doing so, I think he was one of the main guys, if not the main guy, to keep Jim's legacy and lineage tradition alive with both the Muppets and on Sesame Street. And if you love Broadway like I do, you always admire someone who's a master at creating and developing characters. And when you look at my guest's incredible body of work shooting with the Muppets and Sesame here in New York City, I thought of no one more appropriate to bring up Break a Bat tonight.

[3:02] Al Malafronte: And he's still doing phenomenal work with his own character, Weldon the IT guy on the Cave In series, in which he created and also stars in. We're so grateful he could join us tonight. So, with that being said, if you'll please turn your attention to HomePlate, just beyond the marquee, now batting Steve Whitmire.

[3:20] Steve Whitmire: Thank you. My goodness, that was a great introduction. I I just have to send you a check or something.

[3:29] Steve Whitmire: I tried to cover all bases. And uh back home, I do still keep a uh little memento from our day together over at Kaufman. Uh you I think you might have told me that was the first day that Kermit the Frog ever signed a baseball.

[3:43] Al Malafronte: Oh, I it would have been.

[3:44] Steve Whitmire: Yeah, it would have been. Uh I don't think we signed very many baseballs. Uh and I and and you know, I I do remember that day because it was a rare thing to sign a baseball. Uh, you know, so yeah, very nice. Very nice. I'm glad you have that.

[3:56] Al Malafronte: Oh, it's uh one of my favorite uh pieces of memorabilia for sure. You know, did you yourself keep much uh memorabilia from your Muppet Days?

[4:03] Steve Whitmire: Well I I I had um I had a small room in the in one of our houses. We we moved to a different house now, but this house had about like a 10 by 12 spare bedroom. And it started out as a um, you know, a great little place with little shelves on the wall, nice little museumy kind of thing with so for almost 40 years I collected, you know, they would send me toys and items and I mean everything, right? All the stuff all displayed nicely.

[4:27] Steve Whitmire: And over the course of the years, it came down to this point where I was just sort of opening the door and throwing the next thing in there and shutting the door really quickly. So it was a mess. I mean, it was a it was uh I don't know whether anybody knows the reference of Fibber McGee's closet, but there was just a you open the door and everything started falling out. So about I guess it's probably 10 years ago now, I decided to donate all of that stuff except for just a few key pieces, because I thought I don't have kids. I thought what am I gonna do with all this stuff?

[4:54] Steve Whitmire: So I donated it to the Center for Puppetry Arts in Atlanta. Uh and they're big supporters of Henson and uh with Jim's work, and Jim was a great supporter of theirs. And they auctioned off this stuff and I autographed a bunch of it. And um, you know, they didn't make a fortune, but they made a little money off of it. And and people, you know, it the the items went to people who are really going to appreciate having them, I think.

[5:16] Al Malafronte: Yeah, that's amazing. I remember when you were doing that. And I saw I haven't been to the exhibit, but I saw that uh, you know, what they've done is really great. And uh, you know, speaking of your hometown Atlanta, Steve, are you on the set of Cave In as we speak right now?

[5:30] Steve Whitmire: I I am actually, yeah. I don't know. I guess people can't see this, but I'm I'm I'm very near the set. We found this um little studio. I'm I'm working with a young man named Liam Nelson, who has his own small production company called New Heaven Productions, uh and growing actually quite a bit. And we had access to this very small, this is actually just a little photo studio, but to do something like KVIN, which is you know a small, small thing, and we shoot these production numbers which look big, but they're actually shot quite small, uh, mostly against green screen.

[6:01] Steve Whitmire: And uh so it's a great little spot, you know, and and he's using the facility for other things as well. Uh so it's worked out quite well. We've actually kind of built it and turned it into a studio. I mean, the building was here, but we made it into a functioning space.

[6:15] Al Malafronte: I think it's so awesome what you've been able to accomplish with Kaven, and really just a short time. I think he started it last fall. And can you tell the folks at home a little about what you're doing with Weldon the IT guy?

[6:25] Steve Whitmire: Sure. Well, um, Weldon came about because I went to um a local group called, well, you know, Adult Swim probably. That they have a um, I didn't go to their television people, I went to their internet people. And they have this, I you know, if you haven't gone to their website, it is bizarre. It's it's just like hour-long stuff. They they will put it pretty much anybody on, I think. I mean, I don't know. It's like cable access used to be back in the 70s or 80s.

[6:52] Steve Whitmire: Um, and I just thought, what a great place to have a character who would critique all the stuff that's on there because you could tear it apart and but do it nicely, you know. So I thought, well, an internet troll, it's an internet thing, it's their website. And I don't think they ever quite understood exactly what I was hoping to try to do.

[7:08] Steve Whitmire: Um I I tried to explain it, but it didn't quite make sense. So I had this idea for this character, and once I had the idea, I had to build the puppet. I had to, you know, come up with a character. So we started doing our own monthly live stream. A month is about all I could pull together on my own. And I'm really doing the whole thing myself. I mean, every part of it. You know, I can see the numbers. I I write everything.

[7:30] Steve Whitmire: Uh I I work with a guy named Jim Lewis, who's worked with us on the Muppets for many years. Jim helps me with some of the writing, thank goodness. And then I've got Liam to help me, and my wife actually helps me puppeteer. But uh it's so it's very small, very kind of in-house thing.

[7:45] Steve Whitmire: And um Weldon just basically is this miserable little troll. Uh he's he's it's an internet troll who hacks people, but he's literally a troll, lives in a cave, and wants to uh hear about your misery so people can call in and talk to Weldon. So we've got this little cult following thing going on now, which is quite fun.

[8:03] Al Malafronte: It's amazing. And you mentioned those production numbers earlier, which I love because they almost remind me of something right out of the Muppet Show. And you know, the most recent one that I watched last night, you actually did a little tribute to Hamilton. I really enjoyed that.

[8:14] Steve Whitmire: No, we actually did. It's funny when we talked about uh when you talked to me about being here. I thought, I, you know, I'm not a because I'm not in New York, I don't know a lot about Broadway and what's going on, except that everything's closed right now. But um, but I so I thought, well, what can I do? And I frankly I've not seen Hamilton, but you can see so much about it online.

[8:31] Steve Whitmire: So we kind of did a uh takeoff on Weldon did a seance last night. And uh the the person he brought back from the dead was Alexander Hamilton. But the thing about Weldon's production numbers is he plays all the parts. So if it's Hamilton, he plays Hamilton. If it's I'm doing something else, you know, we did a we did a Tiger King one, which we call the Ogre King.

[8:50] Steve Whitmire: And Weldon played about five different characters, you know, from the Tiger King. So it's a silly way to do parody, and it it is rather Muppet-like, I think. I mean, we that's that's my background and what I was mentored in, so it's what I want to do. And you know, it's been nice. I know that you're taping it back home in Atlanta, but you've brought a little of that like uh Rizzo the Rat New York edge to the character. It makes it very relatable for us up north.

[9:13] Steve Whitmire: Well, I think Rizzo, um, of all the characters I've ever done over all the years, Rizzo was always my favorite. Um, because he was a character that I did originally, and I did that character for about 40 years. And being, you know, not that I didn't love Kermit, of course, but but but Rizzo was my own kind of thing. And I did less of Rizzo. So he was this snarky kind of character.

[9:34] Steve Whitmire: And I would say Weldon is like a mixture of Rizzo and Oscar the Grouch times about 10. You know, you can get away with being a little bit more edgy because we're on the internet. Although I did make a conscious decision to keep it, keep it sort of family friendly. Um at the time when I started doing Weldon, I read that I read something on the internet where parents were being sort of, you know, snookered into getting their kids to watch stuff that that was showing up on children's channels, but then right in the middle of it, it would go very blue.

[10:03] Steve Whitmire: And I thought, well, I can do anything I want to, and you can always get laughs that way, but I thought, you know, let's keep it, let's keep it clean.

[10:09] Al Malafronte: Yeah, it's very easy to get cheap laughs by you know, making a puppet say like a four-letter word or something.

[10:14] Steve Whitmire: Yeah.

[10:15] Al Malafronte: And you know, speaking of Rizzo, one question I get asked a lot, Steve, what's your favorite film about Broadway? There's been some cool ones over the years, but as they often say, you never forget your first, which for me was the Muppets Take Manhattan, which is kind of like Rizzo's coming out party, I think, in a lot of ways. And I can't think of many better films that capture the spirit and the essence of New York City and Broadway better than that one.

[10:35] Al Malafronte: And you know, almost 40 years later, when you look back on that production in particular and filming here in the city, what stands out the most?

[10:41] Steve Whitmire: Oh my goodness. Well, honestly, um, and I can talk about the production too. In addition to the production, my wife and I were there, and she worked on the film as well, and we both had to find a place to live temporarily over the summer. And it was, I always thought it was hot in the south in the summer. First summer I'd spent the whole summer in New York City.

[11:00] Steve Whitmire: It was dreadful. And uh, I mean, incredibly hot. We're outside on locations, everybody's sweating. We discovered two things that summer. One was HBO. It's the first time we'd ever had HBO in an apartment. Second was Hagendas. So we went, so our our normal routine was to go to work every day, go back to our little apartment place we had rented, and and go, you know, watch HBO and plow through a pint of ice cream each.

[11:23] Steve Whitmire: So by the end of the shoot, we had both put on about 20 pounds. And we were we were also in the middle of shooting Fraggle Rock during that time. So by the time I got back to Fraggle, I kind of had to like go on this diet to lose about 20 pounds, you know. But it was a great summer, and uh Frank Oz directed that film, and of course, Jim was alive at that point, and we had just an enormous amount of fun.

[11:43] Steve Whitmire: I have some home movies that I did on Super Eight film of that whole thing that nobody's ever seen. Someday maybe I'll I'll show them somewhere. But just us out on the street being silly and doing our stuff and rolling around on the ground, you know.

[11:58] Al Malafronte: And you know, you and Jim got to do a pretty iconic scene as you were doing Rizzo and he was doing Kermit at the time at Sardi's, which is one of our favorite places to grab a little bite before a show. Not sure if you've been back since, but you know, Sardi's still keeps that caricature of Kermit from the actual movie up on the wall.

[12:14] Steve Whitmire: Oh wow, I didn't know that. I haven't been there in a long time. That's that's great to know.

[12:18] Steve Whitmire: Yeah, we um and we really shot in the restaurant that day. I mean, we were like, you know, five of us. You know, the funny thing about the rats, because the rats are were quite small little puppets. So you've got these big people trying to get little tiny puppets into this tiny little space in particular around Kermit for that particular scene.

[12:35] Steve Whitmire: And uh, so all you know, if you got this big restaurant, and then right in this little spot, we've got you know seven people all clumped together, you know, under a table. Uh yeah, it was great fun though. I loved doing that film a lot.

[12:45] Al Malafronte: You did so much great work in New York City, and I feel like it would probably be impossible to chat with you about, you know, New York in particular, and not touch on one of the most famous streets in the city.

[12:55] Al Malafronte: And I want to touch on something that someone told me that back in the 90s, Sesame Street used to get so excited for you and Frank Oz to come on set, where they would block off like two whole weeks where it would just be the two of you guys on the floor at Kaufman Astoria Studios, and you were doing either Bert and Ernie or Kermit or Grover, and you were like making the crew lose it to the point that they forgot they were on the set of a kid's show.

[13:18] Steve Whitmire: And you know, when you look back on in your time doing Ernie and an iconic character like that, can you talk a little bit about what that meant to you and maybe some of your highlights from the I guess 23 years you were on Sesame Street?

[13:29] Steve Whitmire: Well, you know, that that was around the beginning of the time that I did two of Jim's characters, shortly after his death in 1990 when I was doing Kermit and Ernie.

[13:37] Steve Whitmire: And um I had not, you know, well, well, when I first started working for Jim in 78, Jim had talked about that I might work on Sesame Street.

[13:47] Steve Whitmire: As it turned out, he chose to bring me to London to work on the Muppet Show.

[13:50] Steve Whitmire: And so for the next 12 years, I never, I mean, I visited Sesame, but I never worked on the show.

[13:56] Steve Whitmire: So my opportunity to actually work on Sesame Street didn't come about until after Jim's death, and then taking on a couple of his characters.

[14:04] Steve Whitmire: And of course, Frank was still doing all of his characters at that point, so we would have these days where we would do a week or two where it was nothing but Ernie and Bert inserts, or as you say, Kermit Grover kind of things.

[14:15] Steve Whitmire: And it was great for me because it's really interesting.

[14:21] Steve Whitmire: It was very hard for me to take over Jim's characters, as you might imagine.

[14:26] Steve Whitmire: Emotionally as well as just trying to do them justice.

[14:30] Steve Whitmire: And working alongside Frank was a big part of being able to make that possible.

[14:35] Steve Whitmire: It was as though the characters that Jim and Frank did together had this odd chemistry that was beyond the two men who did them.

[14:46] Steve Whitmire: It was like, you know, uh Ernie and Bert had a chemistry, and of course that was Jim and Frank, but it's like those two characters had the chemistry.

[14:53] Steve Whitmire: So when Bert would do what Bert was supposed to do, it I sort of instinctively knew what Ernie was supposed to do.

[15:01] Steve Whitmire: That they they had a relationship.

[15:03] Steve Whitmire: And it was like there was this sort of vibe in the air that that surpassed the two guys, you know.

[15:08] Al Malafronte: Oh, that's amazing.

[15:09] Al Malafronte: I and I I can only imagine, you know, especially considering how closely you worked with Jim.

[15:13] Al Malafronte: I don't think it would be possible to take those on hat unless you had worked so closely with him.

[15:18] Steve Whitmire: Um I I think so too.

[15:21] Steve Whitmire: I think so too.

[15:22] Steve Whitmire: It you know, the Muppets have been consistently done by the same people all those years while Jim was alive.

[15:29] Steve Whitmire: And um really Jim's a part of Jim's outlook toward the Muppets was quite objective.

[15:36] Steve Whitmire: I think he thought of the Muppets as just being, you know, the puppets were tools that that he used to express himself and his puppeteers used to express themselves.

[15:45] Steve Whitmire: And if you were someone who was watching the Muppets, whether it was the Muppet Show or Sesame or anything else, you were sort of seeing right past those puppets, you were seeing the people.

[15:55] Steve Whitmire: And what was going on underneath those puppets really was characteristic of the people.

[16:00] Steve Whitmire: So they it really was just like people wearing masks, you know, or playing a part.

[16:04] Steve Whitmire: The Muppets, Frank used to say the Muppets were less puppets and more characters.

[16:09] Al Malafronte: Now let me ask you: so you have an established character like Kermit the Frog or Ernie.

[16:14] Al Malafronte: They had, you know, been around forever, you know, to the point when once you had taken them on.

[16:18] Al Malafronte: How do you develop that character and you know, kind of make, you know, make it so it's not a stale copy, so to speak?

[16:25] Steve Whitmire: Yeah, I think that ties into what we were just mentioning, because um it it would be it'd be very easy to, you know, say, well, I'm gonna gather all the material.

[16:34] Steve Whitmire: If I could, you know, now you go watch YouTube and I'm gonna look at everything Jim ever did, and I'm gonna, you know, really try to get into who that character was.

[16:41] Steve Whitmire: But you really can't do it that way.

[16:43] Steve Whitmire: Um what clued me in, and I sort of knew this, I don't know, it seemed instinctive, because I knew that Jim was Kermit and Kermit was Jim, and Ernie was Jim, you know, I I started thinking about the things that Jim did when he was performing those characters.

[17:02] Steve Whitmire: You know, we we would make these extreme faces underneath the characters where we're, you know, overacting in our own faces to push this performance out through our hands, you know.

[17:10] Steve Whitmire: Um I worked closely enough with Jim that I remember what he looked like when he did Kermit, a face he made or a certain expression.

[17:18] Steve Whitmire: And I also was able to kind of decipher between the things that he did that were kind of just Kermit, and then the things that were Jim that he did that went into Kermit.

[17:29] Steve Whitmire: You know, you'd go to dinner with with Jim, and he would do things that were very Kermit-like.

[17:33] Steve Whitmire: And I'd say, Oh, that's Jim, but he does that as Kermit as well, you know, certain speech patterns and pacing and expressions he would use.

[17:40] Steve Whitmire: And so that all really came in handy.

[17:43] Steve Whitmire: I I really don't think I would have been able to do either of those characters without having known Jim.

[17:50] Steve Whitmire: There was one I wanted to ask you about because it was probably my favorite as a young kid because I'll never forget like going to Blockbuster and getting the VHS tape for the first time.

[17:58] Steve Whitmire: And I feel like a lot of our folks in the audience would probably appreciate this because I think he did like a Sesame 30th anniversary special at Radio City Music Hall.

[18:07] Steve Whitmire: And I remember Kermit doing the Sesame Street News Flash, like right in front of those uh brass doors.

[18:13] Steve Whitmire: And I think you got to sing as Kermit and Ernie with Jimmy Buffett and Sean Colvin in that one.

[18:18] Steve Whitmire: I know you're a big music guy too.

[18:20] Al Malafronte: Do you have any great memories of that?

[18:21] Steve Whitmire: I feel like that's just like the biggest dream come true for a performer.

[18:25] Steve Whitmire: Well, Jimmy Buffett and his whole band are just the most laid-back, decent, nice people you will ever want to meet.

[18:30] Steve Whitmire: I mean, just the nicest guys.

[18:33] Steve Whitmire: And I we just sat around and talked about life.

[18:36] Steve Whitmire: I mean, you know, in between takes.

[18:37] Steve Whitmire: Um, we did a song called Caribbean Amphibian, I think was the one we did with him.

[18:41] Steve Whitmire: And um, I mean, he's terrific.

[18:44] Steve Whitmire: He he's just an amazing person, and he loved performing with Kermit, as most of our celebrities did.

[18:49] Steve Whitmire: And then the Sean Coleman piece that we did with Ernie, we actually shot in California in the desert.

[18:55] Steve Whitmire: Uh I mean, I can't remember all the locations, but I know I was distinctly remember being lying down in the back of a car driving through the desert at dusk.

[19:04] Steve Whitmire: Uh, I I can't remember the piece exactly, but I remember the car in the desert.

[19:08] Steve Whitmire: Um, and it was, you know, I I mean, it was always fun when we worked with people who loved the Muppets.

[19:14] Steve Whitmire: And I can't think of a single celebrity over the years.

[19:16] Steve Whitmire: There were a lot of them who didn't find some joy in working with these characters, you know.

[19:22] Al Malafronte: Yeah, and you got to work with a lot of special ones.

[19:24] Al Malafronte: I do have to know though, did Buffett take you out for margaritas after the shoot that day?

[19:28] Steve Whitmire: Well, no, we didn't quite go that far.

[19:29] Steve Whitmire: I had a work day the next day, so I'm sure he and his guys did that, but uh so switching gears to Kermit, because I think that's really uh, you know, such a huge part of your legacy, obviously.

[19:43] Al Malafronte: You know, to step into that character, I I like you mentioned before, how intimidating it is.

[19:47] Al Malafronte: Do you have a favorite project or a certain moment where you felt like you arrived and you felt as though you really captured the essence of that character to the point, you know, you went to on to do it for 27 years.

[19:58] Al Malafronte: That can't be easy.

[19:59] Al Malafronte: So there was there like a certain moment where you're like, damn, I got this.

[20:03] Steve Whitmire: Um a couple of things were nice in that regard.

[20:07] Steve Whitmire: I honestly, throughout all the years, I was constantly always coming up with new things for Kermit to do and new parts of him that were being added.

[20:17] Steve Whitmire: What was important to me, and you used the words lineage earlier, was that Jim had, you know, wanted indirectly suggested I did this.

[20:26] Steve Whitmire: He had he was looking for someone to do Kermit in case he got too busy to do Kermit.

[20:30] Steve Whitmire: And though he had never talked to me about it, I guess he had mentioned it to other people.

[20:33] Steve Whitmire: So I felt a great responsibility for this.

[20:35] Steve Whitmire: And I knew that if Kermit simply became just a copy of Jim, he would get very stale very quickly and he would lose his connection to the audience.

[20:43] Steve Whitmire: So I was always trying to add new things and and movements he could do and and and and parts of his personality, uh, but keep them based on Jim's original.

[20:53] Steve Whitmire: Um, I remember when we did uh The Muppet Christmas Carol, which was the first big project we did after Jim's death, uh, where you know, we had done a couple little things, but all of a sudden I was cast as Kermit.

[21:05] Steve Whitmire: Not only cast as Kermit in a big movie, but also Kermit was playing someone other than himself.

[21:10] Steve Whitmire: So it was like twice removed, you know.

[21:12] Steve Whitmire: Very interesting, fun uh little thing to figure out from an acting point of view.

[21:17] Steve Whitmire: But um, so when we were doing the promotional work on that film, we would um, you know, we do all these interviews and and current, we'd have like a day of interviews, and everybody would go to Kermit.

[21:27] Steve Whitmire: And I remember Jerry Nelson was doing Robin, Kermit's nephew next to me.

[21:32] Steve Whitmire: And at the end of the first interview, we worked together during the film, but he turned because it was all improvised during the interviews, and he turned and said, You've really got this now.

[21:42] Steve Whitmire: And I thought an objective opinion from someone who worked with Jim since the basically the beginning.

[21:48] Steve Whitmire: And I realized that maybe I was on to it, you know, maybe I had latched into it at a good point.

[21:54] Steve Whitmire: Um, so that was good to hear that to hear that kind of reinforcement from someone who didn't have to say that if they didn't believe it, you know.

[22:00] Steve Whitmire: Um, but I think that film kind of crystallized Kermit, at least to a certain degree, uh, at that point, was it was really being thrown into a big project and and having to sink or swim.

[22:13] Al Malafronte: And it's amazing, you know, in those early Kermit years, you guys were doing those great films, and you mentioned Kermit playing a character other than himself, you know, Mop the Treasure Island comes to mind too.

[22:22] Al Malafronte: And you got to work with these great iconic songwriters because you got to work with Paul Williams in on Mop at Christmas Carol, and then Barry Mann and Cynthia Wilde on uh Mop and Treasure Island.

[22:32] Al Malafronte: That must have just been like uh incredible.

[22:34] Al Malafronte: Now let me ask you when you're recording, let's say One More Sleep Till Christmas, which is probably we got the holidays coming up, no better song for this time of year.

[22:42] Al Malafronte: And you know, even you did like Sailing for Adventure and all those great but what is there was Cabin Fever, all those great songs from Love of Treasure Island.

[22:50] Al Malafronte: Were they in the studio with you?

[22:52] Al Malafronte: And one other thing I'm curious about is, you know, when you're performing Kermit or Ernie or Rizzo, any of these characters in a recording studio, is it tough to channel the because you know you're not just a voiceover artist, you're a puppeteer.

[22:52] Al Malafronte: Is it tough to channel the characters without the actual puppet in front of you when you're singing songs like that?

[23:08] Steve Whitmire: Well, you know, it was um tough on Christmas Carol, because uh that was again my first project where I'd really done Kermit in a in a major way.

[23:18] Steve Whitmire: And Paul Williams was there, Paul was there, and and we went in to sing.

[23:23] Steve Whitmire: And I remember being very nervous about that the day before and thinking, you know, this is gonna be tough because you can get us get away with a certain amount of latitude if you're doing the puppet while you're doing the voice.

[23:35] Steve Whitmire: People are watching the puppet and hearing the voice, and they might forgive you a little for the voice.

[23:39] Steve Whitmire: So suddenly I'm going to the studio, there's no puppet to hide behind, just me in front of a mic and Paul Williams, right?

[23:44] Steve Whitmire: And a bunch of people.

[23:46] Steve Whitmire: So I'm thinking, well, this is gonna be intimidating.

[23:48] Steve Whitmire: And it was.

[23:50] Steve Whitmire: Um, and I remember I and I did one more sleep till Christmas.

[23:56] Steve Whitmire: Paul just they just rolled a track and I just sung it as Kermit.

[23:59] Steve Whitmire: And Paul in my ears, very quiet, I had the headphones on, in my ears very quietly, he said, now that's Kermit.

[24:07] Steve Whitmire: And I, and again, I was I was relieved.

[24:10] Steve Whitmire: I I took a beat deep breath, I was fine, and we picked it.

[24:14] Steve Whitmire: Basically, he took the first take, and then he picked up bits and pieces.

[24:18] Steve Whitmire: Um, and it, you know, I had rehearsed it, but but there's only so much rehearsal you can do.

[24:22] Steve Whitmire: You have to just shut your eyes and sing the thing, especially a song as pure as that.

[24:26] Steve Whitmire: You know, it's either gonna be Kermit or it's not gonna be Kermit, you know.

[24:31] Al Malafronte: That's so true.

[24:32] Al Malafronte: Do you have a favorite Muppet project that you got to work on, Steve?

[24:36] Steve Whitmire: I think my favorite show that I ever worked on was probably Fraggle Rock.

[24:41] Steve Whitmire: Uh I know that's a different set of characters, you know, other than the standard Muppet Show Muppets.

[24:46] Steve Whitmire: But Fraggle was an interesting project.

[24:49] Steve Whitmire: You know, Jim set that project up and then was only there a little bit of the time.

[24:54] Steve Whitmire: We shot in Toronto.

[24:55] Steve Whitmire: We had an incredible group of people, an amazing crew.

[24:58] Steve Whitmire: We all we really talk about becoming a family with that group of people on that show, as much as anything I've ever worked on.

[25:05] Steve Whitmire: Everyone was involved, and everyone was putting in suggestions.

[25:08] Steve Whitmire: And you know, anybody's suggestions were listened to.

[25:12] Steve Whitmire: You know, it was very collaborative.

[25:13] Steve Whitmire: And I don't mean just the creative people, I mean like the grips.

[25:16] Steve Whitmire: You know, if they they'd say, I don't, we don't think that's in character.

[25:19] Steve Whitmire: And we'd pay attention to that, you know.

[25:21] Steve Whitmire: Um, and so uh that was also at the point in my sort of development as a as a puppeteer with Jim's company.

[25:30] Steve Whitmire: I was about five years in.

[25:31] Steve Whitmire: And Jim used to say, I remember you're saying the very beginning, it usually took people about five years to get accustomed to the way he liked to do things.

[25:39] Steve Whitmire: And he was right.

[25:41] Steve Whitmire: And at my fifth year there, I just about is when Wembley Fraggle came along as Prockett.

[25:46] Steve Whitmire: And uh it was, you know, I was, you know, as light as Wimbly was, it was really me sinking my teeth into a character.

[25:52] Steve Whitmire: Although Wembley was largely just me at that age. Um, his indecisiveness and the silliness of the character was, you know, his hummingbird metabolism was a lot of who I was when I was about 23. It's so funny you say that. The indecisiveness, because my I didn't watch Fraggle Rock that much growing up, but the scene that I love and always stand out to me is I think it was you and Jim together doing Wembley and convincing John. And the whole point of the number was that like Wembley couldn't make a decision and convincing John is gonna tell it, sell it, spell it just for you. And that was like the whole point of the scene. At the end, like Wembley gets all tough and macho. I'll never forget that.

[26:34] Al Malafronte: Yeah, oh, that was great. And it was very special to all of us when Jim would come through town, you know, and he'd direct an episode or he would do he had a couple of characters he did, convincing John was one. He did one called Cantus, who was kind of this roaming minstrel who came through, and he was very kind of, you know, almost double talk, but kind of this very spiritual character who would say prophetic things, you know, and play music. And anyway, so Jim, it was really Jim coming through town, you know, is these characters. Um, so just great fun all the way around. Everything about that show. That was such a special one.

[27:05] Steve Whitmire: And you know, you shine in so many different ways during your time with the Muppets. I particularly loved those live appearances, whether it would be, you know, if you were on Kimmel or Fallon or even during the Macy's parade, I remember you would do some stuff with Kermit and Ernie, even alongside our friend of the show, Al Roker. Um when you get to improv like that, how much fun is that for a performer?

[27:26] Steve Whitmire: Well, I think it's probably the most fun thing that I ever did. I mean, I in terms of anticipating doing something, that's what I always was the most thrilled about going to do. We go to a film and you should you do your lines, and you, you know, I mean, this the secret of working in a film like that, and I suppose this is true with any actor, is to improvise what's written essentially. You know, you have to make it your own words, but it's not quite the same. And I always found that all the characters grew during our PR times, because suddenly they're on their own and they're being challenged with questions and situations, and that's when I would discover new things about the character oftentimes.

Uh Kermit in particular. Uh, because you know, once I was doing Kermit, I was doing a lot of Kermit. Kermit was, I was very busy as Kermit. And even during downtimes when people weren't really necessarily seeing the Muppets doing things, I was still out there doing appearances all over the place. And Al Roker, you mentioned Al. I just love Al Roker. And you know, we don't see each other much these days, but we did many things together over the years, including the parades. And he's just one of those people that, you know, you go back to the Today Show and he's always there and he gives you a hug, and then you I drop down on the floor and we do what we do, you know. Um but my favorite thing is always the improvisation, which is why I kind of enjoy going back to this cave in thing because most of that is improvise. Uh so it's something I always love doing.

[28:56] Al Malafronte: Were there any personalities in the media or folks from the entertainment industry that you think worked particularly well with the Muppets or even folks who kind of struggled to channel, you know, what it would take to put on a good show with these characters, you know, that you're performing on your hands right next to them?

[29:14] Steve Whitmire: Well, you know, we worked with so many different celebrities during the Muppet Show. I mean, it was a different celebrity every week. I did the second half of those five years, but total it was 120 or more people. And so once in a while you'd have somebody come in who was kind of like less comfortable looking in the eyes of the puppet, you know, than they were. They kind of look past the puppet down to you, you know, you're down here. Uh and I don't think it ever showed particularly. Uh, but there was a certain comfort level. Some people could just immediately drop into working with the puppets. Um, I mean, we did a lot of work with John Denver, which I loved. He was a terrific person, and we really got to know him.

You know, once in a while you'd have celebrities come in that you'd work with for the three or two or three days on the Muppet Show, and then they were wonderful, but you probably didn't ever see them again or you know, know them again. But we had people like John Denver, um, you know, the Star Wars guys we kind of got to go know, Anthony Daniels and Peter Mayhew and Mark Hamill. Uh, we kept up with them for a while. One of my favorite guys to work with was always Tom Bergeron. Uh, I love Tom, and we still keep in touch all the time. We did a lot of dancing with the stars and other things together, Hollywood Squares. Henry Winkler's a great friend. I mean, there's a few people who really click with the characters. Um, just treat them like real people is really the secret.

[30:33] Al Malafronte: Yeah, that's I it comes off on screen. The one it's funny, you mentioned I've seen a lot of the John Denver stuff that you guys did both on the Muppet Show, and you did that holiday special. I remember back. Yeah, I don't know if that was late 70s or early 80s. And the other guy I always thought was good was Jeffrey Tambor. That was really I thought he was good too.

[30:49] Steve Whitmire: Jeffrey's great. Um, he's another person who just clicked with the puppets so well with different puppet characters, he was very comfortable with them. Particularly actually, I have to say, with Bill Beretta's characters, uh, Jeffrey and Bill really clicked together well. Their style of humor plays off of each other quite well. It's a more of a dry sense of humor. Um, and Jeffrey is so good at that.

[31:12] Al Malafronte: Now you mentioned Bill Veretta, one of my favorites. Do you still keep in touch with a lot of the Muppet guys?

[31:17] Steve Whitmire: A little bit. Um, you know, they're doing their thing and I'm doing mine. And I tend to be so busy with what I'm doing that we have kind of gone our separate ways to a large degree. But uh, but they're all out there doing their stuff. And Bill, as probably as much as anybody, but you know, Bill and I were, I loved working with Bill so much, especially with Pepe and Rizzo, uh, Pepe the Prawn. And those two little guys were, you know, there's so much more I would love to have done with those two because they were great fun together. These two little spunky guys who were just, you know, both kind of stupid, but they were falling off of each other, you know.

[31:53] Al Malafronte: Yeah.

[31:55] Steve Whitmire: Now, I this one might be a little bit of a tricky subject. I just want to preface to my audience that I do like the Walt Disney Company. I'm a lifelong fan of Disneyland, one of my true happy places. I'm a Disney Plus subscriber. I've even talked about that recently. But when Disney first bought the Muppets in 04, there was a lot of dysfunction when it came to picking the right people to run the Muppets studio, as far as trying to integrate the characters under a very new structure for you guys. And I know Frank Oz has spoken out about how they don't trust the performers. You had some very fair grievances over the years. How soon into the relationship did you realize that there were going to be some problems?

[32:29] Steve Whitmire: Well, it was um, when I look, you know, hindsight's 2020. Um the fellow who was the original executive who came along, who was going to oversee the Muppets at the very top. Uh, we were shooting this film called Muppets Wizard of Oz, which probably not one of our most shining moments, but it was anyway. We shot the thing. And um, it was kind of the first thing that was during that crossover time in 2004. And very enthusiastic young fellow, and he came in and he was shook your hand, and he's we're gonna have such great fun together. Within the first paragraph of the sentences he was saying, he said, and we're gonna get a dozen people to do each of the core characters so we can have them all over the world at the same time.

And I think all of our us who were kind of those main performers, our faces probably, I can't imagine what our faces look like. It must have just dropped. It was it's exactly the wrong thing to do with the Muppets. Um, because they are so individual. And you know, it's it's kind of exactly the wrong thing to do. So that initiative went forward for a while. We politely fought against it and prevailed once there was a new set of executives coming in, not because they wouldn't have done it, but because they realized they really didn't need to do it, so why have a problem over it? You know, there wasn't enough work. Why do you need 12 people? There weren't enough, there was enough work for 12 Kermits, you know, and it would have just sucked all the life right out of the characters.

They would have become this sort of amalgamated this stack of traits, you know, and all these people would have they would have been boiled down to a set of traits and they would have just become stale, you know, no connection with the audience. So that didn't happen, thank goodness. Uh, maybe it won't ever happen. Uh so we I knew pretty early on, we were we had a little issue there.

[34:14] Al Malafronte: Now, this is just for my research, and this does seem to be accurate. It I find it interesting that the folks that were involved in that last ABC series are no longer with the Disney company. I just thought that that was pretty interesting, and they were the ones that made the the pretty unpopular decision a couple years ago to re-connect Kermit and whatnot. So I was just like, I don't know if I it seems like there was a whole like mirage of you know, folks that they brought in to try to make it work. And you guys did some, there were some great projects that I particularly loved. I did like the 2011 Muppet film, but I know you know Frank has spoken out about it in different ways, but no, there was some good stuff there, but I do find that interesting that these folks that made such a big decision aren't even with the Muppets anymore.

[35:00] Steve Whitmire: Yeah, it's true, it's true. I often um, you know, I mean, in my dreams, I keep thinking, God, maybe I should just go back and talk to the new people there and say, maybe, you know, I'm probably not who I was portrayed to be. So I'll let you make that judgment for yourself, but maybe we uh maybe we could try this again. I after all, I was there for nearly 40 years. Maybe you know, I could take a four-year break and come back. Um, you know, I who knows. I it was um, it was just an odd thing. You know, um, I felt like there was never any problem that we couldn't work out. And one of the things that bothered me the most is I think an awful lot of people felt that the reason I was asked to leave, well, I wasn't asked to leave, okay.

But anyway, uh, the reason I was recast was because I was gouging for a lot of money. Uh and that was not the case. I was making the same money when I left that I was 14 years before when I came in. I never raised my fees. It didn't make sense. You know, when you're doing as many as six or seven projects a week, you don't go back and renegotiate each one of those. They need to know what they're gonna pay you. Otherwise, you can't be nimble enough to get the work done. You know, so it was always a flat fee, and that's the way it worked. But I think the real issue in the end, and I I think I can say this, it's not a big, I've said it before. I was, it was very important to me that every project we did, um, those of us who were overseeing it, you know, and those executives as well, needed to look at that project through the eyes of the characters, not just through the corporate eyes, and not even through our own eyes, but what does this project look like from the point of view of the characters?

And if it doesn't suit that character or the group dynamic of all the characters, doesn't mean it has to go away. It means we need to rethink it. You know, let's really decide whether whether this suits the Muppets. And part of what I felt was important for the characters to be handled in the way that Jim did this was for the performers to be treated well. Now, what I mean by that is that we all get our health insurance and our pensions because we're part of SAGAFTRA. And so I never wanted to do anything that should be under the unions without it being under the unions. And I was occasionally asked to let that go. And if there was no clear cast classification, I would do it. You know, I'd say, okay, well, you, you know, we no, but they don't have an opinion.

If they had an opinion, I would say, look, you guys, you need to bring this up to your producers, you're supposed to do this, you're hiring us. So that was really the ultimate issue in the end. Um, situations over the union issues. And, you know, uh, should I have stood up for it? Well, yeah, I guess I should have. Um, nobody was yelling and screaming at each other. I was just saying you need to do this right. You need to treat your puppeteers like Jim treated his puppeteers. You need to respect them and treat them well. Uh, and um, I was wasn't the only person speaking up for that, but I was the only person really to really put anything on the line for it. And look where look where it got me on the break of that podcast, talking about what can make the Muppets the Muppets again.

[38:07] Al Malafronte: Listen, I Steve, it's no secret that the new version of Kermit the Frog has missed the mark for a lot of people, myself included. Do you think that, you know, the I'm not sure if you know who the new executives are, but would they be open to bringing in someone like you or a Frank Oz, you know, to help write the ship?

[38:22] Steve Whitmire: I I don't know. I don't know. I don't know them, I haven't met them, the new folks who've come in. I understand, I'm you know, I keep up with a couple of people, and they've all said that that the person who's directly in charge is just terrific to work with and talk to and really wants to learn and doesn't pretend to know everything about the Muppets and would really like to learn. Um the thing that's slightly concerning for me is that there's barely anybody left.

[38:48] Steve Whitmire: Dave is still there, Dave Goles, but there's nobody there who left who really worked with Jim. Now, I you know, it all and and and I'm not it makes me sound old. I don't want to sound like I'm stuck and it's got to be a certain set of ways, but I think it needs to be built on a foundation. I think for things to evolve and be progressive, they need to rest on the foundation from where they started and then grow from that. But that foundation, that core is important, and I think a lot of that is lost. Um I you know, we did uh the ABC series a few years ago, and it got most people didn't like it. Um there are things about it I liked, things about it I wasn't crazy about. Um the tone of the show was a little too slow for me.

I think the puppetry, the actual like physical stuff we did with the characters was in some cases kind of mind-blowing. I mean, it was really good. I was very proud of our puppet work. Um, and even you know, just the acting to try to make the characters so subtle, but I just think it may we went a little too far with that, you know. I don't think it was quite right. But again, that's tone, you know, and tone comes from where the Muppets were, you know, and and how they started and and what Jim felt they were, and what we all felt they were back in, you know, back in the 80s. Um, and they don't have to be stuck there, but it'd be nice if they were still built upon that, and I'm afraid we've lost that. Uh, no one has any direct reference to the originators of the characters anymore.

[40:15] Steve Whitmire: And they wouldn't have it if I was there either, really, except that I have that. And what I had hoped to be able to do was to bring that in, and I still believe that it could be integrated back into a big company like Disney. I don't I don't think it has to be, well, there's the corporate side and the creative side and all that stuff with the Muppets, it doesn't matter, we just need to make money. That doesn't matter. We it if to in order for them to be financially successful, they need to be creatively successful. And that starts with them being based on who they are.

[40:45] Al Malafronte: Yeah, no, absolutely. And you always channeled those characters in such a great way. You know, sometimes in spite of the writing, I mean, I think that's what you were able to accomplish, was just incredible. And you, you know, you've accomplished pretty much everything there is in the puppetry world. Is there like one master fantasy project that's kind of swirling in your mind right now that you'd like to bring to life?

[41:06] Steve Whitmire: Well, there's two. One of one of them I won't talk about because it's something I might try to do one day. It has nothing to do with the Muppets. Uh, it's it's a big ambitious thing that I would like to try to do on my own, uh, on my own with a hundred other people. Uh but it was something I'd like to head up and do. Uh, it wouldn't translate into anything the Muppets would do. There is also a project that I was due to pitch um within the Muppets. Uh had I been there for another month, it would have happened because that was I've been told I was been invited to pitch this. There were a lot of things I was told that I was invited to do that didn't quite happen in the end. Uh, but that's another story. Um, but I was gonna pitch this thing.

[41:44] Steve Whitmire: Uh I was co-writing it with one of the Muppet writers, and and actually they were writing, and I was just making suggestions. I was almost more producing it. I believe uh this, I know this, I don't want this to sound arrogant, but I truly believe it would be the definitive project that would have turned the Muppets around. Uh, it was a multi-part series, probably for lack of at the time I called it a Netflix-like series. Um, limited kind of thing, probably, probably six episodes sort of thing, that I really believe would have reintroduced the Muppets to the new generation of viewers in a way that it would have made them, the Muppets their Muppets, but still left them based on who they are.

[42:32] Steve Whitmire: Uh, it was an origin story. It it was nothing like the Muppet movie, but but it could have mirrored that kind of a feeling. Uh the Muppets to re-t read retelling people who they are at this point. And and then as a springboard, it would have moved on from there. And unfortunately, uh as the at this moment, I bet that project never gets made. Um, because my name's on it for one thing.

[42:57] Steve Whitmire: And um, but you know, if I ever was back there, that's the first thing I would ask them to look at. Because I really think it would turn everything around.

[43:06] Al Malafronte: Yeah, and and listen, I'm being blunt here, but they need that right now. They need someone to turn it around. And um, you know, for a lot of the reasons that you just said it's not happening at the moment. But um, you know, on a brighter side, we do a little segment on the show, Steve, called Fastball Derby. And you are a master storyteller. It's a chance for you to, you know, let the fans know a little bit more about you and some of your fond memories. And, you know, just to use the baseball terminology. I want you to think of this as like the bottom of the ninth inning. There's two outs, the game's on the line. You know, you've hit a bunch of home runs in this game or this episode so far. This is your chance. Okay. Your chance to bring home the winning run. So I'll ask you, uh I'll ask you some questions and you just tell me what comes to mind.

[43:45] Steve Whitmire: Okay. All right, I will try. Favorite New York City meal.

[43:51] Steve Whitmire: So I'm sorry, say again.

[43:52] Al Malafronte: Favorite New York City meal.

[43:54] Steve Whitmire: Meal.

[43:56] Steve Whitmire: Oh my God. See, look what you've done to me. All right. I know, I know my favorite New York City meal, and the restaurant has gone out of my head. Doggone it. What's the food genre, Steve? I could probably help you with it.

[44:13] Al Malafronte: Indian, Indian, Indian.

[44:13] Steve Whitmire: It's gone. It's gone. So it's some little place. I haven't eaten there in six years, so the place has gone out of my head. It's over on Broadway. Oh my God. Okay. Well, what came to mind was Indian.

[44:33] Steve Whitmire: Every, every every type of every type of what we used to call ethnic food in New York, like Indian Thai.

[44:43] Al Malafronte: Yeah, they've got the best of the best there. How about this one? We've got Thanksgiving right around the corner. Best your favorite story about performing in the Macy's parade.

[44:53] Steve Whitmire: Oh, I was in under afloat, like just barely off the ground, in what amounted to uh what amounted to a coffin. Uh lying in this thing, Kermit was singing a Christmas song, sitting on top of a log, and in order for me to be flat on the deck, I had to lie, you know, imagine lying flat on your back with your arms straight out in front of you so it's sticking straight up for about four hours.

[45:16] Steve Whitmire: Um, which means just forget it if you need to go to the bathroom. There's no chance of that. And uh, and the but the best part was I was the only person in the parade that the parade allowed to have a live microphone. It's uh throughout the parade, it's not allowed. And I was able to, and I had a monitor so I could see with little cameras all over the float. I could pinpoint people and Kermit could talk to them.

[45:41] Steve Whitmire: And the response from the crowd was just emotionally overwhelming. Because they knew it was not just some guy doing a puppet, it was actually Kermit. It was an amazing New York moment.

[45:55] Al Malafronte: Love that. Now you did some promotional work, by the way, at Yankee Stadium. And I think Kermit was sitting in one of the seats. Was it kind of like the same setup where you're kind of like buried under, you know, buried under the seats there, just really uncomfortable?

[46:08] Steve Whitmire: Yeah, I did something at some point with uh Mayor Bloomberg where I we were sitting next to he was there with Kermit. And and and I'm down on the ground for hours. The the thing I remember the most about it, and it wasn't, I don't think it was on purpose, but he's sitting to my left, and I'm reaching across with Kermit, so they look like they're sitting in a couple of seats right at home plate, as well as I remember.

[46:29] Steve Whitmire: And he was eating peanuts, and he kept throwing the shells down on me. I'm down there and they're falling all over my face. You know, I'm peanut shells everywhere, everywhere while I'm trying to talk as Kermit.

[46:45] Al Malafronte: Oh my goodness.

[46:49] Steve Whitmire: Usually you just have a working under show business, you know.

[46:54] Al Malafronte: Yeah, usually it's just the drunk fans in the upper deck that are like throwing peanut gels and veer, you know, down on people. But yeah, good to know that the mayor of New York City, that's what he liked to do.

[47:02] Steve Whitmire: Yeah, yeah.

[47:07] Al Malafronte: I'm cracking up. I'm glad I brought that one up.

[47:09] Steve Whitmire: Oh yeah, that's that's that one that really happened.

[47:14] Al Malafronte: Now, this is actually a question for my little cousin Sal, who wants to know which was the most fun Muppet movie you got to make.

[47:24] Steve Whitmire: Well, you know, I I'm gonna have to give you two answers, but my my favorite probably was because I had so little responsibility, actual responsibility on it, was the very original The Muppet movie with Rainbow Connection and all of that original stuff. It was it was my first film, but it was also the Muppets first feature film.

[47:43] Steve Whitmire: And uh I was 19 years old. I had just gotten married, went off to California, my wife and I, to work on a movie at 19 years old, and it was just an amazing thing to happen. Um so much fun. I got to do so much work, and I was just filling in. I did a lot of filling in for other other puppeteers doing their characters, like I did a lot of Fozzie when Frank was doing Piggy and stuff like that, you know.

[48:08] Steve Whitmire: And and the other, I would have to say that Muppet Christmas Carol is a favorite, again, because it was the first film we did after Jim passed away. And I know in my own mind, it gave me a sense that we were actually going to be able to make a go of this without him. You know, as hard as it was. It was a very emotional film for us.

[48:27] Steve Whitmire: Um but it it sort of said, you know what, we might get away with this.

[48:37] Al Malafronte: How about this one? This is a two-parter. All-time favorite performances Ernie, and all-time favorite performance as Kermit.

[48:45] Steve Whitmire: One of my favorite things I ever did with Ernie was a guest spot on the Today Show with Katie Couric. It was Ernie and Bert. And it was right after Eric Jacobson had begun to do Bert.

[48:57] Steve Whitmire: Frank was not available, and Eric was now doing Bert. So Eric was less comfortable doing a live spot, rightly so, because he he wasn't that accustomed to being Bert yet. I was I was fine with Ernie at that point. I've been doing it for a while.

[49:12] Steve Whitmire: And so it's funny because I mean, this is Eric, Eric likes to prepare, and he's he's much less prepared about that now. He can do more improvisation, but he came in with a massive number of scripted things. And I remember thinking this first time we'd done this type of thing together, you know, you're not gonna be able to use any of that because by the time you first of all, you have to hope she asks you that question that you've got an answer written to.

[49:36] Steve Whitmire: And second of all, by the time you find it on your paper, it's too late. You needed to answer already in a live situation. So Katie Kirk would ask a question, and Ernie's take on this, by the way, was they were in the studio, but Ernie being from Sesame Street, he didn't know what a studio was.

[49:51] Steve Whitmire: So Ernie kept saying, you know, gee, Katie, I this is a you have a great apartment here. You know, he thought it was her place. So that was our our uh conceit. And she would ask a question, and Bert, I would give Eric a little pause, like as long as you could give somebody to answer while he's looking for his answer.

[50:06] Steve Whitmire: And then I would jump in really quick. And so Bert didn't do much talking because it was just hard. It's so hard when you first start out, you know. But that one stood out and it was fun. And the and the conceit of Ernie thinking it was her apartment was fun. She was always fun to work with.

[50:21] Steve Whitmire: Um probably my favorite little thing I ever did with Kermit was Queen Elizabeth's Jubilee. Uh, it was her, oh see, now I'm gonna screw it up. Was it her 75th birthday or 75th year as queen? It's one of those. I think it was the year as queen.

[50:36] Steve Whitmire: It was this called the party at the palace, and it was this massive concert out on the lawn of Buckingham Palace. And I had this tiny little thing I had to do. All Kermit was doing the whole evening was sitting on the edge of the stage. They cut to him for 30 seconds, and he introduced somebody.

[50:54] Steve Whitmire: So again, no real responsibility. I just had to, Kermit just had to say, ladies and gentlemen, you know, here is so and so. It was just a little moment. What I got to do was be at Buckingham Palace all day long and sit in the front row while people like Paul McCartney did their sound check.

[51:10] Steve Whitmire: Um and and Queen and you know so and you know, I'm the only, like me and two other people who were with me were sitting in the front row while Paul McCartney's there, and he'd say, How do I sound? Do I sound okay? Um not you know, you mean and then they digest and he'd say, What about now? So it was that kind of thing. And then backstage, Paul McCartney comes over to me, he says, Okay, so and he didn't look at me, he just puts his head down and puts his ear to me and he says, So let me hear it. And I and I I didn't know what he was talking about. It didn't click. And he said, I just I want to hear it. And I still I'm standing there like an idiot. Um and I'm a little bit starstruck, of course.

[51:46] Steve Whitmire: And he said, The voice, I want to hear the voice. He wanted to hear Kermit's voice. So I, so that's what he wanted. So, and so he closed his eyes, I did Kermit's voice, and he just started laughing. He loved it. Um, so things like that. Ozzie Osborne standing next to me in a urinal at Buckingham Palace. That was a trip. It was kind of creepy too, frankly. Uh, he kind of comes, you know, this you're standing there at the urinal, yeah, you're in a urinal. I don't mean women don't have to deal with this. And they're not, you know, it's not no dividers. It's like a portable thing. And this somebody comes in and they're going, oh, it'd been anywhere but the palace, you would have run out of the men's room.

And this guy kind of sidles up next to you, you know, you go, I don't know. And it's Ozzy Osborne. Pretty weird. Pretty weird. How often would that happen, right? The Queen McCartney and Ozzy all at one party. And of course, you get to meet the queen, which is cool too. I mean, you know, how often do you get to meet Queen Elizabeth, you know? And you have to say all the right things. When you meet the Queen, you're supposed to, there's a, there's a this protocol, and you and you're you're meant to follow it. And you you first you have to refer to her as your majesty. That's part of it. You have to say that. Very nice to meet you, Your Majesty, or something like that. Then you can call her ma'am.

But you have to, but those two things. And I had met her once before, and I was so nervous that when she came down the line, she offered her hand. You don't you don't touch her unless she offers her hand. She offered her hand. I took her hand, her little gloved hand, and and I said, and I'm very nervous. I said, it's very nice to meet you, your mem mm, mm-hmm. I couldn't get ma'am and majesty to like click in my brain. And she looked at me, she was so sweet, and she just sort of did this face like it's it's okay. It's really okay. You know, she let me off the hook, you know. She didn't have me thrown in the tower or anything, you know. I love that one. That's so great.

[53:49] Steve Whitmire: How about this one? Fact about Steve Whitmire that would surprise people the most. Oh, you know, if you saw me in a lot of my daily life, you'd see me with a chainsaw, taking down tree limbs, you'd see me riding around on a farm tractor, you know, bush hogging paths in the woods. Um, I have a little bit of property here, and I really spend a great deal of time doing property management. Um, it's a great chance to get outdoors, and it's something I can do even when there's a pandemic, you know, because I'm out there breathing the the real air, you know. So yeah, I I think people probably wouldn't expect that. I I look like a different person. How about this one? Uh, place that you were recognized or instance where you were recognized without a puppet on your hand that surprised you the most.

Can I tell you one that made no sense? Absolutely. There's no rules in fastball derby, Steve. You tell us whatever you want. Somebody thought they recognized me, and they had no idea who I was. I got out of a cab in New York City with my wife one time, and she handed me the cab receipt to write down, because we were keeping receipts for like tax purposes, right? So I'm signing this thing and I hand it to her. She turns to walk away, and three teenagers come running over and say, Can we have your autograph? And I said, Oh, but I I don't even, you don't even know who I am. And they said, No, but you just signed an autograph for her. And I said, No, that was my cab receipt. They they they didn't know who I was.

They just thought I was some guy with long hair who was signing autographs for this other woman. So that was a strange one. And it was a little scary, you know. I thought, wow, this is what people deal with. Only in New York. Yeah. I had an I had the entire audience from a live show. Uh Tony Danza used to have a talk show. We did the show. We went out to lunch afterwards with a reporter who was working for TV Guide who wanted to do an interview, sitting in this little deli, and all these people kept coming up asking for my autograph. And this guy was like, and I, what the hell is this? And and the the reporter was saying, geez, does this happen all the time? I and I said, it never ever happens. Turns out it was a school group who was in the Tony Danza audience and had seen me at the show. So they didn't know who I was either. They just saw me do Kermit on the show, you know.

[56:11] Al Malafronte: Oh, that's amazing. Well, hey, listen, as I mentioned in the intro, I was the one of the first people to ask for a uh Steve Whitmire autograph when uh when I had the chance to meet Jason.

[56:21] Steve Whitmire: Oh yeah, well, thank you. That's nice. Now, how about this one? You literally toured the world with Jason Siegel to promote the 2011 Muppet movie. What's your craziest story from the road with Siegel?

[56:32] Steve Whitmire: Oh my God, it was must have been Mexico City. That was weird. We were, I mean, Jason was was crazy and wonderful. And I didn't get to work with him very much during the film. Most of our scenes weren't together. He was shooting with, you know, Peter Lynz and Walter, and I was doing Kermit. They weren't together all that much. And I got to know him far more when we were doing this is okay. You're gonna love this is bizarre. I don't think I've told this story. I'm trying to think of a clean way to tell it. Um, so we're doing a day of those interviews, like day two, where we've got you know, press coming in, Kermit is next to Jason, they've got the camera set up, and a press person sits across from us, and we're doing these one-on-one interviews.

And so we're really tired by then. I mean, we're in a different time zone. We were out late the night before having dinner, you know, we're just exhausted. And we're just slugging Red Bull down, you know. And this woman who actually spoke very good English, was was uh, you know, trying to speak English to us, uh, because I didn't speak Spanish well at all. And Jason actually learned Spanish over lunch, oddly, it was very strange. He came back from lunch and knew Spanish. I don't get it. But anyhow, she looks at us and she says, her last question, and we were primed to lose it because we were so tired. She looks at us and she says, So I'm not gonna try to do the accent. She said, So now that you have done the movie, what will uh focus in the future?

And we lost it because it didn't sound like focus, it sounded like what you think I'm saying. He looked at me, I looked at him, and I had to stop. I had to bring the puppet down. I was laughing so hard that I couldn't keep going with Kermit because we thought she said the F word. F use, F use in the future. What she was saying trying to say was focus. But what she said was F use in the future. And we lost it, we couldn't keep going, we had to stop. Yeah, you kind of had to be there, but it's one of those moments when the giggles were gonna happen, and when they did, we had to stop for 15 minutes. And then she was apologizing. I'm so sorry, my English, my English. And we were saying, no, no, no, it's not you. You're English, we're so tired. The English is fine, you know.

[58:58] Al Malafronte: Oh, I love that. That is so good.

[59:02] Al Malafronte: How about this? How about this one? Uh, you're a big music guy. What's your desert island album?

[59:09] Steve Whitmire: Oh God, there's so many things. I'd have to I'd have to put it together myself. I love so much different music. Um, what am I listening to? I've I've kind of gone backward a little bit. I like pulled out the Grand Funk Railroad and the and the Uriah Heap not so long ago again from my teenage years. Um a lot of instrumental stuff. Like I was a I used to play keyboards in uh these high school rock bands. So Rick Wakeman and Keith Emerson and guy named Patrick Moraz, who's with the Moody Blues, I love their work. Uh, if you know who they are, they were with Yes and all those bands. Um, you know, I and and yet, uh, I don't know, about 10 years ago I got in. Do you know who the executioners are?

[59:47] Al Malafronte: I actually don't.

[59:48] Steve Whitmire: And I love old school classic rock and whatnot, but I don't. They are uh like these DJ guys who do scratching stuff with all these rap stars uh and hip hop guys. And I mean it's uh it's just amazing. It's all rhythmic, amazing stuff. You know, I I so much music. So much useless music in my head that I should, if I could clear that out, I'd have so much more space for new things, you know.

[1:00:15] Al Malafronte: Oh, we have two more good ones here. This next one is what is your favorite quote or what is your favorite Rizzo the Rat quote?

[1:00:23] Steve Whitmire: That's from our uh listener fast food Nick. Wow, that's such a great question. Favorite Rizzo, I wish one would pop right into mind. What popped into mind is not necessarily my favorite. The one that gets the most quoted to me is uh light light the lamp not the rat, because that just became uh you know, when this tale was set on fire. But I I mean I I can't think of another quote that's very well known. So I guess I have to go with that one just because it gets quoted to me all the time. People love that quote.

[1:00:51] Al Malafronte: That's a great one. I also loved it was uh Treasure Island, it's like he died, and this is supposed to be a kid's movie.

[1:00:57] Steve Whitmire: Yeah, good lines in that. That was Jerry Jewell and Kirk Thatcher wrote that stuff, and it was it was an amazing script. I love that.

[1:01:06] Al Malafronte: And uh, this is the last one that we always use to wrap every show, Steve. Uh, what's the best piece of advice anyone ever gave you?

[1:01:12] Steve Whitmire: Oh, you know, I know that I have a very definitive answer on that. It's never believe your own PR. It comes in handy all the time. I I don't mean if you're your personal PR or like with the Muppets, you know, the greatest thing the Muppets have ever done. Well, you know what? It wasn't really. You know, never believe it. You know, it might be wonderful, but don't believe your own PR. You're better off if you've stayed more objective about that stuff.

[1:01:41] Al Malafronte: Oh, Steve, this was amazing. And uh, you know, I'm so grateful that I had the chance to talk to you. Um, you know, for the folks at home who may want to connect with you on social media and with Kavin or your website, why don't you tell uh everyone where they could find you online?

[1:01:54] Steve Whitmire: Sure. Well, I do a lot of Instagram. Um it's Steve underscore Whitmire, so that one's easy. Uh I just actually got a new website up and running it about about two months ago that's SteveWitmeyer dot website. Not dot com, but dot website. So it's easy. Steve Whitmeyer website. Um Kavan, the best way to find Kavan is to go to YouTube and you can search the name of the channel is Kavin, you know, with the hyphen in the middle, but there's that's something else called Kaven. So why don't you search the character's name? Search Weldon, the IT guy, and it'll pop up. And all of our shows are there, all the production numbers. If you don't want to sit through these long hour-long shows, you can just watch uh the playlist of production numbers, which are kind of fun.

[1:02:35] Al Malafronte: Well, that's awesome, Steve. And I I'm certainly uh a monthly viewer of Kevin. You've done such great work with it. And listen, you know, it's such an honor to sit down with you today. Thank you so much for joining us.

[1:02:46] Steve Whitmire: Well, I thank you for making it so easy. I was so concerned because uh I thought if you asked me a lot of sports questions, I'm in trouble. I tried to make it my one time, uh my one sport thing is that when I was in school, I was throwing a softball around with a bunch of friends one day, throwing it as high in the air as possible and then running under it to catch it. And I looked up at the softball and it was eclipsing like the sun, like the moon would do. So you've got dark ball, bright circle. Just as it got about 10 feet from me to catch, I'm saying, I got it, I got it. The eclipse cleared. I got the sun in my eyes. I got hit in the forehead, and I woke up on the ground with three people saying, Are you okay? It's like those scenes like uh it's like Miss Piggy in uh Green Muppet Cape for all like the birds like kind of flying around your head.

[1:03:30] Al Malafronte: Exactly. Exactly. That that's the extent of my sports experience. My sport career was ended by an injury. And then you put the glove away for a puppet and it worked out.

[1:03:40] Al Malafronte: That's right. Well, Steve, thank you so much again. This was awesome. And uh for folks at home, thank you so much for listening. Be sure to subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. This is Al Malafronte signing off for Break a Bat and the Broadway Podcast Network. We'll see you next time.

[1:04:00] Al Malafronte: Thanks for listening to Break a Bat. This is produced by the fine folks at the Broadway Podcast Network. Visit and subscribe at BPN.fm slash breakabat. You can find me online at break underscore a underscore bat underscore podcast. And you can also find the Broadway Podcast Network on Instagram at Broadway Podcast Network. It's been so great having you here with us today, and we'll see you next time.