Hipsters and Squares, Part One

Hipsters and Squares
Part 1: Imagine On, Baby!

Now, dig this: Henson didn’t just discover hipsters in the late 60’s. Henson and hipsters are solid, Jackson, all the way back to the beginning of his career.

Back on Henson’s first show, Sam and Friends, there was Harry, the grand-dad of all the swinging hipsters to follow. Harry always had his shades on, like Mahna Mahna and Floyd Pepper after him. One of the best-known surviving clips of Sam and Friends is a sketch called “Visual Thinking,” where Harry teaches Kermit how to imagine shapes that appear above their heads. By the end, Harry and Kermit are be-bopping so much that they get buried under their own riffs.

A decade later, we see a similar sketch used on Sesame Street…

Voice cast: Northern Calloway (Hipster), Frank Oz (Square).

	(Frank plays a man in a suit and tie, with a huge orange nose. His voice is deep and self-important, like Sam the Eagle. Northern plays a free-spirited hipster. Northern enters, scatting.)
Northern	Zap — zoo da — zow!
Frank	All right, uh, we’re going to imagine shapes today.
Northern	We gon’ what?
Frank	We’re going to imagine four different shapes, and the first one is a circle.
Northern	AAOW! Circles! I like circles, yeah.
Frank	DON’T — DO that.
Northern	Oh.

Frank	Now, do you know what a circle looks like?
Northern	Yeah, well, I know, yeah — a circle, a circle, it looks, uh… looks round! Circles look round.
Frank	Yes. Watch closely, I’m about to imagine a circle.
Northern	Imagine on, baby.
Frank	Here we go.
	(As Frank imagines the circle, it appears on the screen. He strains, it’s an effort for him to imagine.)
Frank	We start over here, you see, and then — if I can imagine it — it’s kind of hard, it goes — around like this, and it goes up again — like that — and it meets that, there.
Northern	Woo!
Frank	Ah, there. A circle. Now let’s see you imagine a circle.

Northern	Aw, I can imagine a circle. Erase yours.
Frank	All right, there.
Northern	Ready! (Funky guitar chords play as he imagines.) Zap-zap! Zip, zow! Looka that, ha ha! This is, this is fun!
Frank	All right, stop it. Get this off me!
Northern	Zop, zap, zoooooo! Yeah! Yeah!
Frank	Stop that! All right, that will do! Get these out of here. Erase that right now!
Northern	All right, all right. (sigh)

Frank	Now, the next shape to imagine is a rectangle.
Northern	Oh-oo! AAOW! Rectangles!
Frank	Will you please stop that. Now, this here is a rectangle. Now, I’ll show you. You start over here, you see… and you go all the way over here with this line… and then we go down… and then we go… over here with another long line… and then we go up and meet… there. Well. That is a rectangle.
Northern	Woo-ee! Hey, can I ask you a question?
Frank	Yes.
Northern	Can rectangles go up and down instead of sideways to sideways?
Frank	Of course.
Northern	All right, then erase yours.
Frank	All right. There!

Northern	Watch this! Zap! Zoo-dow! Zip-a-doo-OO!
Frank	Well, that’s very good, uh, but —
Northern	La de doo-doo… da doo…
Frank	What’s that? What is that?
Northern	Well, this is a design.
Frank	A design?
Northern	Decoratin’ it! Ha ha!
Frank	We don’t need that, just stop those dots. Get rid of that. Erase it! Erase it!
Northern	Ohh, all right. All right!

Frank	All right. Now. We are going to imagine triangles.
Northern	AAOW! Triangles! My favorite thing!
Frank	Please stop that!
Northern	Oh.
Frank	Now, here’s a triangle… start over here… go up… and then we meet the other… there. All right. Now you try a triangle.
Northern	All right, here we go. (He starts playing the two triangles like a guitar.) Waaaa! Yeah, yeah! Hey! Y’know what this looks like?
Frank	What?
Northern	Yeah! Looks like… zap! Oo-oooo! Oo-weeee!
Frank	Stop that, stop that! That’ll do! We don’t need that! All right, stop it now!
Northern	All right, all right. (He plays a lick of Bach’s Minuet in G Major on the guitar.) You like this?
Frank	What’s that?… That’s better.
Northern	It’s a catchy tune.
Frank	Yes, well, let’s, uh, throw it away. Erase it. The whole thing. Gone.
Northern	All right, all right.

Frank	Now, the last shape we’re going to imagine is a square. Do you know what a square is?
Northern	I know who a square is! (He draws an arrow pointed at Frank, and busts out laughing.)
Frank	Uh, that’s cute. Uh, now, let’s see you imagine a square, then.

Northern	All right. Za – ba – daaaa – zeeba-deeba – zeeboooo… Imaginnne… (He draws a square around Frank’s head, boxing him in.)
Frank	Uh. Uh, what’s going on?
Northern	Hey, I need my guitar back. (He draws the guitar again, and starts playing.) Woo-oo-oo!
Frank	(trapped in the square) Hello there!
Northern	(strumming) Rectangles, circles, triangles and squares!
Frank	Hello out there! Hoo-ha!
Northern	Rectangles, circles, triangles and squares!
Frank	Let me out of here!

By Danny Horn