The Muppet Show: Sex and Violence

I caught this when it first aired (I think) in the summer of 1975. Viewers today seem to look at this pilot as a misfire, with its odd set pieces and the low-key Nigel as host. (Nigel would later be the conductor on "The Muppet Show.") Me, I loved it and I still do. It used "Airplane" style humor years before "Airplane". Keep your eye on the clocks in the backstage office and see what I mean. Anticipating another gimmick popular today, it rewards viewers who sit through the credits with a surprise or two. And it was deliberately aimed at adults, with a bizarre "Seven Deadly Sins" pageant.

Henson and company would learn from this show. The really weird sketches would remain, but almost always as musical numbers, and the show would be tied together as a revue hosted by the more versatile Kermit.

But I'll always cherish the incredible 1/2 hour of joyful senselessness this show represented. Aside from some holiday and fairy tale themed TV specials, the Muppets had never had a full production like this, and this time their were no rules. So we got rubber-limbed wrestlers, birds squawking pickup lines, Mount Rushmore spouting knock-knock jokes, and so on. Heck, some of the characters, like the Swedish Chef and the complaining Stadler and Waldorf, would turn out to be pretty popular.

While not as great as the show it helped launch, it did show a glimpse of what was to come and for that, I have it to thank. The pilot is basically a muppet show episode, Albert slower paced and with more hit or miss jokes and skits. Funny to think how Kermit wasn't the original host. If you want to see the muppets history and how they got their show, I'd point you to this.

stars: Jerry Nelson as Floyd Pepper and various sins.

Jim Henson as Nigel, Dr.Teeth, Swedish chef, Waldorf, Rowlf and Kermit.

Frank Oz as Sam the Eagle, George the janitor, Animal and others.

Richard Hunt as Statler, The Wrestler, Greed, Abraham Lincoln and other

Fran Brill as Janice and various sins.

Dave Goelz as Zoot, wrestler 2 and various sins.

This is obviously a pilot to the show, but also very different than the show. We've got Nigel the band conductor backstage before an Electric Mayhem concert. Sam the eagle is there with him, and they end up playing chess. Meanwhile the Electric Mayhem has a concert. The sub-plot stories are Swedish chef, talking Mount Rushmore, Statler and Waldorf at home, two wrestlers that end up tied up and the Muppet Show's At the Dance segment. Meanwhile, Nigel, Sam and Electric Mayhem's Floyd introduce the deadly sins. Very entertaining and great! You can find this show as a special feature on Muppet Show season one.

TVPG A plus.