Muppets – Cinefantastique

Muppets Most Wanted & The Creeping Terror – Dossier Fantastique 5:12.2

Posted on March 25, 2014 by Steve Biodrowski

What’s new in horror, fantasy, and science fiction this week? Open Dossier Fantastique to find out! This week, the usual Cinefantastique podcasting crew – Lawrence French, Dan Persons, Steve Biodrowski – is joined by special guest Andrea Lipinsky. Together, they review the latest in theatrical and home video releases, including: MUPPETS MOST WANTED, currently in theatres; and HAPPY CAMP and KILL ZOMBIE, available on Video on Demand. Along the way, they react to the Walt Disney Company’s announcement that Pixar is finally developing a sequel to THE INCREDIBLES. And they wind up with a 50th anniversary look back at THE CREEPING TERROR, a prime contender for being one of the worst films ever made (take that, PLAN NINE FROM OUTER SPACE!)
And after the closing credits, don’t leave! Because – there’s more! Listen in the the bonus chat as Lawrence French speculates that Disney’s decision to set the STAR WARS sequels thirty years after RETURN OF THE JEDI conveniently coincides with the actual ages of the cast from the original trilogy. Could this mean they will be making return appearances?

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Frank Oz: The CFQ Interview

Posted on March 14, 2013 by Dan Persons

It’s amazing some researchers haven’t figured out a way of determining personalities based on what aspect of Frank Oz’s career one is impressed with. Of course there’s Yoda — Frank voiced the beloved, and powerful, Jedi master, operated the puppet for most of the STAR WARS films, and for many helped form the heart and soul of the franchise. For me, it’s both the time he spent with Jim Henson — developing characters such as Miss Piggy and Grover and innovating puppetry in that surprisingly visionary company — and his work in the director’s chair for LITTLE SHOP OF HORRORS, taking the musical stage adaptation of the Roger Corman’s dark comedy and creating a rich and wondrous, albeit murderous, film world. I was able to talk with Oz on the occasion of the Blu-ray release of the film, which restores the original, apocalyptic Don’t Feed the Plants finale that was cut from the theatrical release. We also got to talk Muppets, STAR WARS, and the mysterious allure of sequel rumors. Click on the player to hear the show.

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Jim Henson & Tale of Sand: New York Comic Con 2011 Podcast

Posted on October 27, 2011 by Dan Persons

Page to Page: Jim Henson's typewriter conjures a cinematic establishing shot in TALE OF SAND.

Lest we forget that Jim Henson was about more than Kermit and Big Bird (ahem, DARK CRYSTAL, THE STORYTELLER, and on, and on…), this year’s New York Comic Con staged a panel in which Henson archivist Karen Falk and Archaia Editor-in-Chief Stephen Christy exhibited footage from the Muppet-master’s experimental short films, commercials, and TV plays, and

discussed the imminent publication of Tale of Sand, a wry, surreal, Kafkaesque graphic novel based on an unfilmed script co-written by Henson and frequent writing partner Jerry Juhl.
After the presentation, Falk and Christy granted us a few minutes to discuss Henson’s eclectic soul, how that translated into the furiously antic/ominous vision that became TALE OF SAND, and how Henson’s history is tied inextricably to that of CFQ. Click on the player to hear the interview.

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