News Update: January 26, 2012

NEWS UPDATE: January 26, 2012

Good news for all you talented musicians who also happen to be Muppet fans out there (and I know you're out there)! Sheet music from The Muppets is now available for purchase online! Now you too can play hits like "Man or Muppet," "Pictures in My Head," "Me Party," and "Life's a Happy Song" on your piano, guitar, or just sing them out loud and strong! The book only costs $17 (plus shipping) on the Hal Leonard Corporation webpage. What more could you need?

Sesame Street is preparing to release a new DVD called "Best of Sesame Friends," which will feature the best clips from the most famous characters on the Street: Big Bird, Elmo, Cookie Monster, Oscar the Grouch, Bert and Ernie, Abby Cadabby, Grover, Telly Monster, Snuffy, The Count, Zoe, and Rosita. The best part? YOU get to help choose the clips! That's right, you can now vote for your favorite clips for each character via Facebook! Voting ends on February 1st, so get in there and vote now! The DVD is set to hit stores in Fall 2012.

As we reported on Tuesday, The Muppets received an Academy Award nomination for "Man or Muppet" for Best Original Song! Well, music and lyric writer Bret McKenzie talked with MTV News about the nomination and his, as he called it, "surprise nomination." He even hints slightly at how he would like to see the song performed at the Oscars ceremony. (With a man and a Muppet... go figure.)

The folks who make the extremely popular PlayStation3 game LittleBigPlanet sure do love the Muppets. Awhile back, they released a special edition Gonzo suit for characters to wear, with the promise of more Muppet stuff soon. Well... they weren't kidding. Now available on PlayStation Network are fourteen different Muppet costumes (Kermit, Miss Piggy, Fozzie, Gonzo, Bunsen, Beaker, Statler, Waldorf, Animal, Floyd, Dr. Teeth, Janice, Zoot, Rowlf), over 200 stickers, and five levels and two challenges inspired by The Muppet Show. It is truly an amazing amount of content made with love and care. Don't believe me? What if I told you that Steve Whitmire, Eric Jacobson, and Dave Goelz went in to record a bunch of gibberish sounds for the characters? Amazing. You can buy LittleBigPlanet and download the Muppet content now! Not sold yet? Watch the fantastic video below and you will be!



Our good friend at ToughPigs.com have discovered another preview of Bloopers from The Muppets via Entertainment Tonight. The bloopers show off 80's Robot testing his driving skills, Muppet Gary (who sounds an awful lot like Johnny Fiama) visiting human Gary and Walter, and much more. Remember, this is just a small sampling of what we'll be seeing, blooper-wise, when The Muppets hits Blu-ray and DVD on March 20th!

Last week Miss Piggy appeared as a guest judge on Project Runway All Stars on Lifetime and the All Stars had to create a cocktail dress for our favorite porcine diva. I won't lie to you, I haven't had time to sit down and watch the whole thing yet, but I've heard that le Pig was phenomenal (as she usually is) and proved herself a very worthy judge. You can catch the entire video of Piggy's appearance on the show thanks to Lifetime's website!

We would also like to send our love to Kermit, Miss Piggy, and James Bobin who are currently in the United Kingdom for the British premiere of The Muppets! Kermit was tweeting and answering questions from fans on the Disney Movies UK Twitter feed. You can read all of Kermit's hilarious and well thought out tweets on the Disney Movies UK page. And to close our News Update, check out this picture Kermit tweeted from the red carpet! The corresponding tweet read: "On Red Carpet doing interviews. Lots of questions abt #MuppetMovie, my tux & whether Piggy & I are wed. Yipes!"

The Muppet Mindset by Ryan Dosier, ryguy102390@gmail.com