Fly me to New Zealand with a puppet

We just flew back to Sydney early this morning on a dreadful Tiger Airways flight from Melbourne. This was a bit of an anti-climax after a fabulous few days of workshops and great meetings with fellow-puppeteers, theatre agents and friends in Melbourne.
On our return, I discovered a new series of commercials made by Hensons for Air New Zealand, starring Rico. I think I'll certainly chose them over Tiger for our next flying adventure. There will be three more cute ads screening on You Tube from 20 October. Check them all out here!
Another interesting interview on Face Book you might like to watch is the launch of Rico's new book about the South Island, which he refers to as a good read by the toilet. Watch it here!
Thanks to PuppetVision.

The life of a British Muppeteer

I discovered this fascinating short documentary by Max Clendaniel, on the life of British puppeteer, Mak Wilson, who has worked on many of Jim Henson's iconic films, such as Labyrinth, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, The Storyteller series, Babe and Dinosaurs. He describes his work with Jim Henson and how when he really started getting close to Henson, was the time when Henson suddenly passed away. Mak played some great characters and describes some of these fantastic opportunities in his life, a life in which he also battled with depression. It's a great little doco. Enjoy.

Muppet Workshops in Atlanta

It only came to my attention today, thanks to a great post by Puppatoons in the States, that renowned Mupeteer Steve Whitmire held two fascinating workshops at the Centre for Puppetry Arts in Atlanta in January. Whitmire took over performing Kermit the Frog when Jim Henson passed away in 1990. (For those of you who've already seen the post, apologies for the repeat). The notes by Puppatoons seem extremely interesting to anyone involved in puppetry for the screen.

In Steve Swanson's weekly podcast MuppetCast, both Part One and Part Two the workshops were wonderfully covered, together with an interview with Steve Whitmire in Part Two.

ABBA - The Last Puppet Video

In 2004, the most expensive music video ever made in Sweden was Abba's The Last Video. Four puppets, manipulated by puppeteers from the Jim Henson company together with some British and local Swedish puppeteers were brought to Stockholm to make this film.

The puppets, miniature caricatures of the original Swedish super group from the seventies ABBA, were trying to get a recording contract in Sweden in 1974. The record boss, however, isn't very impressed by their size. The four original ABBA members also made cameo appearances in this video, which was especially made for the Eurovision Songcontest. You can now watch the 'Making of the Abba's Last Video' here!
(Thanks to PuppeteersUnite)