‘The Muppet Show’ At 50

The original incarnation of The Muppet Show lasted five seasons and 120 episodes, from 1976 to 1981, and in that time some of the biggest names in show-business lined up to take the stage alongside Kermit the Frog, Miss Piggy and Fozzie Bear. A notable exception was the late Elizabeth Taylor, who, perhaps realizing her mistake, provided her recipe for “Spicy Chicken”, to sit alongside John Travolta’s “Lobster with Three Sauces.” Ivana Trump’s “Beef Goulash,” General “Stormin’” Norman Schwarzkopf’s “Sour Cream Peach Pie” and Yo-Yo Ma’s “Barbecued Spare Ribs with Beer and Honey” in the 1996 cookbook, In the Kitchen with Miss Piggy.

At its height, Jim Henson’s series earned 21 Emmy nominations and 4 wins between 1977 and 1981 alone and spawned eight theatrically released movies. This year, The Muppet Show turned 50 with a one-off special guest-starring Sabrina Carpenter, Maya Rudolph and Seth Rogen, and, to celebrate this milestone, we take a look back at some of the stars who trod the boards of The Benny Vandergast Memorial Theater with Kermit and co…

1 — Rudolf Nureyev (1977)

Expectations were so high for the arrival of the world’s greatest ballet dancer that Sam the Eagle wore a tux for the occasion. Nureyev performed three musical numbers, including a pas de deux with a human-sized Miss Piggy, played by Graham Fletcher of The Royal Ballet (Wayne Sleep was not available). In the show, Kermit explains that this is an excerpt from “Swine Lake”, in which a beautiful princess has been turned into a pig by an evil magician. Sam later apologizes for all the indignities the Muppets have made the great artist suffer, but Nureyev won’t hear it. “I wanted to do them,” he replies. “And it was fun!”

2 — Rita Moreno (1976)

Rita Moreno’s performance of the song “Fever,” made famous by Peggy Lee, remains a classic piece of Muppet comedy. Backed by Floyd Pepper on bass and Animal on drums, Moreno oozes sex appeal in a slinky red dress. Her sultry, finger-clicking turn is upstaged at every turn, however, by the increasingly out-of-control drummer, who she finally squashes between two cymbals. “I got my first Emmy for it, but it didn’t show in my career,” Moreno said later. “You know, once you have a Latino name, you’re sort of f*cked. But Frank [Oz] and Jim [Henson] loved it. They felt I was a Muppetess.”

3 — Johnny Cash (1980)

The Muppets faced a hostile takeover with the arrival of country legend Johnny Cash; the show is set to be a co-production with country radio station WHOG, but Kermit finds himself in the firing line from the radio show’s host Big Tiny Tallsaddle. Big Tiny plans to replace all the Muppets with his own cronies, bringing in comedian Wally Whoopie behind Fozzie Bear’s back. Cash sings several songs, including “Ghost Riders in the Sky” and, as part of a medley with Miss Piggy, “Jackson,” one of the few times he performed it with anyone other than his wife June Carter Cash.

4 — Gene Kelly (1980)

Looking good at 68, Gene Kelly arrives at the Muppet theater expecting to attend the show as a guest, and for a time simply watches from the wings. When Miss Piggy points out that he hasn’t actually done anything, Kelly serenades her with “You Wonderful You,” but has to pivot to Gonzo when she is called off to appear in “Pigs In Space.” Kermit’s attempts to have Kelly perform “Singin’ in the Rain” fall on deaf ears, until the poignant finale, in which Rowlf plays the opening bars over and over again and Kelly wistfully croons a few bars before heading out into the street, brolly in hand.

5 — Liza Minnelli (1979)

Featuring guest star Liza Minnelli as a film noir-style actress whose show is being plagued by a series of murders and Kermit as a Bogart-like ’40s gumshoe, this episode won a special Raven Award from The Mystery Writers of America. Beating the famous Moonlighting episode “The Dream Sequence Always Rings Twice” by six years, it plays like a meta-version of The Muppet Show itself, featuring a dance routine in heaven (with The Great Gonzo as the angel Gabriel), Minnelli singing a version of “Copacabana” in character, and the killers finally being unmasked as the grumpy Statler and Waldorf.

6 — Liberace (1978)

Władziu Valentino Liberace gave his usual all to the Muppets, but after a brief intro in which the flamboyant musician is given a Muppet piano as a pet, he kept his powder dry for the first half of the show, giving the spotlight to Miss Piggy, smashing plates in a raucous version of “Never on a Sunday.” The second half sees him play a mini-concert especially for birds, with Liberace performing everything from “Chopsticks,” Liszt and Chopin and “shameless boogie-woogie” in a rhinestone-studded tuxedo. The show ends with Liberace hiring The Great Gonzo’s chicken act to be part of his Las Vegas set.

7 — Glenda Jackson (1980)

A classically trained actress in her early years and a Labour MP for the last 20-odd years of her life, Glenda Jackson was nevertheless a dream guest for The Muppet Show, telling the writers, “You people know what you’re up to. I’ll do anything you write for me.” This they duly did, writing a storyline in which the guest star turns out to be the infamous pirate captain Black Jackson, with a fake penguin that turns out to be an evil pirate parrot. Miss Piggy is captured and sentenced to walk the plank as Black Jackson turns the Muppets’ theater into a pirate ship and sets sail to look for buried treasure.

8 — Alice Cooper (1978)

Alice Cooper had already appeared on Hollywood Squares and The Snoop Sisters when the Muppets came calling and was more than ready for it. Introduced by Kermit the Frog as “one of the world’s most talented and frightening performers,” Cooper plays himself with a twist: as well as a well-known rock singer, belting out the hits “Welcome to My Nightmare” and “School’s Out,” Cooper is also a sulphurous agent, working on behalf of a client who can offer “fabulous riches and world-wide fame” in exchange for a person’s soul — a Faustian deal that very nearly seduces Miss Piggy, who drops out at the eleventh hour.

9 — Vincent Price (1977)

Filmed just before Halloween and inexplicably not aired until the new year, this horror-themed episodes saw a riot of three-headed monsters, demons and ghosts in aid of special guest Vincent Price, deemed by Statler and Waldorf to be the scariest actor since Thudge McGerk. See-through specters haunt the backstage area of the Muppet theater, a Muppet News report warns of man-eating furniture, and Kermit turns the tables on Price during a long talk about acting by sprouting fangs and biting the horror icon’s neck.

10 — Roy Rogers and Dale Evans (1979)

The husband-and-wife duo known as the “King of the Cowboys” and the “Queen of the West” had been a wholesome staple of American TV since The Roy Rogers Show first aired in 1951. To make them feel at home, the show has a country makeover, with cows, horse- shoe-pitching, and a medley of Western songs including “Tumbling Tumbleweeds” and “Happy Trails.” Mysteriously, Miss Piggy is nowhere to be seen, but Kermit takes center stage in her absence and even throws in a reference to his own budding movie career after Rogers claims to have made 189 films: “Wow! You know, I’ve only made one. 188 to go…”