All About Muppets

Bruce Hunter is a Canadian actor, puppeteer, writer, director, and producer who only performed on the Canadian Sesame Street special, Basil Hears a Noise. He has a more vast work outside of Sesame Park as mainly an actor for television and film. Bruce's only other puppetry is seen on Puppets Who Kill and Kids' CBC, the former he did for adults and the latter he did for children. Hunter has mainly been an actor on-screen for numerous different projects such as The Red Green Show, Phil the Alien, Meet the Family, and more. He has also written for shows like After Hours, SketchCom, and Comics!. He even voice acted on Time Warp Trio, Atomic Betty, Cyberchase, and Ace Ventura (series). There just doesn't seem to be anything that Bruce Hunter can't do when it comes to television. As a director, he directed The Kids in The Hall, Grocery Mishap, and The Puck Stops Here, just to name a few. Other puppeteers he worked with include James Rankin, Ali J. Eisner, Pier Paquette, Bob M...

Juanpa Zurita is a Mexican social media influencer, vlogger, actor, and model who appeared as himself in a Sesame Street YouTube special called Elmo's Mindfulness Spectacular. During the special he was turned into a chicken and a pickle from Abby's magic. Juanpa operated a pickle version of himself in an interview with MILENIO. Zurita must have been excited to appear alongside the Muppets of Sesame Street for that special, since new Sesame Street content are being made for YouTube recently. Who has trained him to operate a puppet for that MILENIO interview, maybe Matt Vogel? And how was he able to speak English when hosting that Sesame Street special? Juanpa Zurita started making videos in 2013 on the Vine app before transitioning to YouTube and contributing to many humanitarian efforts. For a young man, he is definitely famous on social media for he has millions of followers on all of his social media accounts. He is probably the first Sesame Street celebrity to also be a soci...

Marilice Cosenza is a Brazilian puppeteer, actress, and singer who does the voice and puppetry of Abby Cadabby on the Brazilian co-production of Sesame Street, Sesamo. She also dubs Abby's voice in the animated segments known as Abby's Flying Fairy School. Marilice performed alongside other Brazilian puppeteers like Kelly Guidotti, Thais Carvalho, Paulo Henrique, and Andre Milano. Cosenza also acted on screen in Brazilian series such as Two Faces, Amor e Revolução, and Jailers, to name a few. She has also lent her voice to two shows; Papaya Bull and As Microaventuras de Tito e Muda. It would appear that Sesamo was the only show she puppeteered on, unless you count a Brazilian version of Avenue Q, as I found online. Other than puppetry and acting, Marilice Cosenza is a great singer and has sung for a lot of Brazilian concerts. Her singing can also be heard on Spotify if people were to look up her name and hear a sample of one of her songs. Apart from Sesamo and Avenue Q (Brazil)...

Martina Klose is a German puppeteer who did both hands of Tiffy on Sesamstrasse from 1977-1988 as the head was done by Kerstin Siebmann-Roders. I wonder if she ever did other minor characters on the show before she left. Martina also worked with other German puppeteers like Benita Steinmann, Peter Roders, Herbert Langemann, and Wilhelm Helmrich, to name a few. Klose must be related to one of the early puppeteers of the show, Lothar Klose, since they both share the last name. It is a shame she does not have a lot of other information on her Muppet Wiki page. Nor does she have a self portrait since it doesn't exist on the web, yet. I wonder if Martina Klose ever had difficulty playing both hands of Tiffy since she has to move them in the coordinated direction Tiffy's head is moving. After leaving, Karime Vakilzadeh and Charlie Kaiser both took over as Tiffy's right hand until Tiffy's retirement. Let us hope that she is still alive and performing today because maybe someda...

Tanzila Afrin is a Bangladeshi puppeteer who does various Muppets on the Bangladeshi co-production of Sesame Street, Sisimpur. It's a pity she doesn't have a lot of info on her Muppet Wiki page. Tanzila worked with twelve other puppeteers on Sisimpur including Parvin Paru, Quazi Nawshaba Ahmed, and Sayma Karim, to name a few. Afrin should have more credits on her Wiki page because you never know when people across Bangladesh will want to know what else she does. Perhaps in the future, her page will have more personal information about herself and what other projects she's puppeteered on outside of Sisimpur. It seems that many international Sesame Street performers are lacking a lot of bios. I will bet that Tanzila Afrin felt excited to work with Sesame Workshop internationally since the puppets are Muppet-type. She also got to work alongside traditional Bangladeshi puppets, technically since she was mainly an assistant/minor puppeteer on that show. Not to mention Martin P. ...

Hugh Spight is a British puppeteer, suit performer, and stilt-walker who was an additional performer on The Great Muppet Caper and puppeteered a Mystic and a Landstrider in The Dark Crystal. He has been paired with two other stilt-walkers for the latter, Robbie Barnett and Swee Lim. It's a shame Hugh only did two projects during his time with both the Muppets and Creature Shop. At least Spight worked with other puppeteers besides the two mentioned above such as Bob Payne, Kiran Shah, Timothy D. Rose, and Christopher Leith, to name a few. Outside, he has done various puppetry and suit roles such as the Gamorrean guard in Return of the Jedi, Daleks in Doctor Who (1988), and a pantomime Puss in Boots in The Elephant Man. He seems to have a more focused puppetry career within the film area since most of those projects listed are all feature films. I only wish Hugh Spight did more Creature Shop projects since numerous of them were filmed in the UK where he's from. IMDb states that n...

Peter MacKennan is a puppet builder and puppeteer who has worked with the Muppets on numerous projects since 1987. On Sesame Street, not only did he build puppets from seasons 19-25, but he also served as an assistant puppeteer for several segments and on the 25th Anniversary special. Peter also puppeteered for the Muppets on Muppet Studios Presents: You're the Director, Free to Be... a Family, and the Jim Henson tribute special in 1990. MacKennan has mainly built puppet characters for many series, specials, and feature films such as Muppet Treasure Island (building Clueless Morgan). I read that in the Muppet Workshop he was a Senior Puppet Designer from 1987-1995 and later served as a Creative Director in the Global Products Division of Sesame Workshop from 1998-2005. Currently, he is a designer and Senior Artist for Puppet Heap, the company responsible for currently designing and building the Muppets. Peter MacKennan is also an artist according to his website and made numerous pa...