MR. POODLEPANTS
Performed by...
Steve Whitmire
First appearance...
Muppets Tonight Episode 101: Michelle Pfeiffer (1996)
Most recent appearance...
It's a Very Merry Muppet Christmas Movie (2002)
Best known role...
Giddy, wacky, balloon-based weirdo
WHO IS MR. POODLEPANTS?
Mr. Poodlepants is one of the strangest and most random characters to ever come out of the Muppet universe. He doesn't really have an act. He doesn't really have a personality. He doesn't really have much of anything except a wild fashion sense, a haircut made out of balloons, and a voice mimicking comedian Ed Wynn. Mr. Poodlepants made scattered appearances throughout the run of Muppets Tonight as was promptly shut out of all but one onscreen appearance after the show ended.
Mr. Poodlepants arrived on the scene in the background of the first episode of Muppets Tonight. One of his few prominent moments on the show came in Episode 103, guest starring Billy Crystal, when he was a guest on Sam the Eagle's "The Eagle's Nest" sketch. Mr. Poodlepants makes an unscheduled appearance to talk about Texas, which he thinks is "The Alpine State!" Poodlepants didn't seem to realize that the Eagle's Nest topic was taxes, not Texas--but that didn't stop him from blowing a giant horn and causing an avalanche to fall on Sam.
Later, in Episode 108 with guest star Jason Alexander, Mr. Poodlepants is murdered during the sketch "Murder on the Disorient Express" (what some called a mercy killing). Unfortunately, Poodlepants threatened to ruin the sketch by constantly reminding the viewers that he wasn't really dead. Mr. Poodlepants' only other semi-prominent appearance on the show came in Episode 211 (guest starring Andie MacDowell), when he conducted the Mormon Tabernacle Penguins--an act Kermit dubbed the worst they've ever done.
After Muppets Tonight ended, Mr. Poodlepants' appearances were cut even shorter. He can be seen as Kap'n Alphabet on a box of cereal in Muppets From Space in 1999 and as Yankee Doodle Dandee in a coloring book from the late 1990s as well. His most recent appearance was in 2010 auditioning (appropriately) as Dopey in the Muppets Snow White comic book. His (hopefully) final onscreen appearance was in It's a Very Merry Muppet Christmas Movie in 2001. Mr. Poodlepants showed up during the "Cirque du So Lame" number, chucking Christmas ornaments at Kermit for no reason.WHY DO THE MUPPETS NEED MR. POODLEPANTS?
I honestly have no idea.
The Muppet Mindset by Ryan Dosier, muppetmindset@gmail.com
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I personally enjoyed Mr. Poodlepants. I found him to be weirdly humorous and thought he had an appealing design. I was even inspired by him to add my own Ed Wynn-ish oddball to the assemblage of cartoon characters I've created and then never done anything with.
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