D23, Disney’s ginormous event for fans and fanatics alike, is going on right now (yes, right now!). And because Disney still owns a Muppet or two, they’re having a panel to reveal what’s going down with the Frog on Sunday afternoon. We’ve got a few operatives staked out and ready to deliver the scoops to you, so keep an eye on this space.
But one big newsbit slipped through the cracks. It seems that Disney is dusting off a film idea that Jim Henson, Jerry Juhl, and Frank Oz worked on back in 1985 called The Cheapest Muppet Movie Ever Made. Jason Segel is attached to write the script (and no, this has nothing to do with The Greatest Muppet Movie Ever Made, which we discussed back in March). Since that’s literally all we know, we can only speculate as to what from the original pitch will be kept or what will happen to Segel’s first script, so let’s talk about what we do know. And that’s stuff we find on the Muppet Wiki (we do love the Wiki around here).
According to the Muppet Wiki article, Jerry Juhl was still kicking the idea around with Jim Henson before he died, so we can probably guess that an actual script was never written. But the idea that Gonzo blows the entire budget during the opening credits is a brilliant one. And the fact that the movie continues to get cheaper and cheaper (and subsequently more and more out-of-control) sounds very much like something the old school Muppets would have done. It’s been a long time since the Muppets have tried to put on a good show and failed (on purpose, natch) like they did every week on The Muppet Show.
Hopefully we’ll get more info at D23, so stay tuned for the scoop!
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