Ian Petrella

Ian Petrella is an puppeteer and actor whose only performance with the Henson Company was on Brats of the Lost Nebula. He started acting when he was only three years old and is best known for playing Randy Parker in the classic holiday film, A Christmas Story. Ian was still acting when he was a teen and soon he started to study improvisational comedy with Groundlings Comedy Theater. Petrella was later production assistant on a puppet show before studying puppetry himself. Outside of Lost Nebula, his other puppeteer credits include the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Power Rangers franchise. I don't know why Ian Petrella has not performed with the Muppets or other projects by the Henson Company after 1998. He performed puppetry independently for film and stage so he would have been perfect for one of the Muppets films like Muppets from Space. At least he got to work alongside other performers in Brats of the Lost Nebula like Bill Barretta, Matt Ficner, Trish Leeper, and John Kennedy, to name a few. I hope that someday Ian will join up with Barretta again and ask if he can assist the Muppets for their next production. Whether it will be live on stage or a television special, Petrella has what it takes to assist the main Muppet performers. He is probably the only Creature Shop puppeteer to perform in the Power Rangers franchise. Ian Petrella, from a child star to a grown puppeteer, you will always be a film star no matter how old you are. As long as you performed in a Henson Company project, you still worked with Muppet performers on that one show. Just be sure that you'll remember how much fun you had working with Bill  Barretta in 1998. Don't stop working Ian. You are a star of all ages Petrella!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Heather Quinn

Image
Heather Quinn is a British puppeteer, cosplayer, singer, and gossiper who did many puppet characters for social media. She is also the only puppeteer who does cosplay, in other words, dresses and acts like their favorite character from a show. Heather also has a love for anything vintage, which I personally find to be unique for a person to like things from the past. Quinn hasn't done anything Muppet-related in her life, in fact she's probably never even heard of the Muppets or the Henson Company. However she has puppeteered many times for social media such as TikTok and Instagram. One of her puppets resembles an Ewok from the Star Wars franchise, which could give a clue that she's a Star Wars fan as well. In addition to puppetry, Heather Quinn has been gossiping on her website about her activities, her travels, as well as her habit of drinking tea. She's also sung all of Sondheim's Company, Into the Woods, and Sweeney Todd, as stated by her on her own website. Ther...
Read more

Gordon Robertson

Image
Gordon Robertson is a Canadian puppeteer who has performed on and off with the Muppets for many years. His most notable work with them was on Fraggle Rock as the body of Pa Gorg and various other characters on the series. Gordon has also performed with the Muppets on The Jim Henson Hour, The Muppets: A Celebration of 30 Years, The Muppets Wizard of Oz, and more. Robertson even performed on the Sesame Street film Follow That Bird and it's Canadian co-production Sesame Park. His Creature Shop work has placed him on TNMT II, The Neverending Story, and Cats & Dogs. Outside of his work with the Muppets, he performed with Shari Lewis on Lamb Chop's Play-Along and The Charlie Horse Music Pizza. Apart from her, Gordon Robertson did various other shows, his most notable ones were Zoboomafoo and Groundling Marsh. He got to work alongside many performers such as Robert Mills, Trish Leeper, Stephen Brathwaite, and Wende Welch, to name a few. Perhaps his best known characters were Zobo...
Read more

Amanda Glass

Image
Amanda Glass is a British puppeteer and costume maker who puppeteered on season 1 of Sooty (2011) as well as part of the third season. She also puppeteered on the Sooty video Sooty: The Big Day Out as well as making many of the puppets' costumes on the series. Besides doing Sooty, Amanda was also an additional puppeteer on Mongrels for three episodes. I personally think Glass should have puppeteered on a project by either the Muppets or the Henson Company (mostly in the Creature Shop). It's currently unknown what the performer looks like since the picture above either has her on camera or under one of the puppets. On both Sooty and Mongrels, other puppeteers she performed with include Iestyn Evans, Yvonne Stone, Simon Buckley, and Toby Olie, to name a few. Maybe someday Amanda Glass will have her chance to meet one of the Muppet performers in the UK or maybe she will learn about the Henson Company online. Nobody really knows whatever happened to her after 2018 when she did seas...
Read more