“Hi ho, and welcome again to The Muppet Show!” says Kermit. “Boy, we’ve got a great show for you tonight, because our special guest star is that wonderful actress and comedienne, Miss Valerie Harper!”
I’m kidding, of course. Kermit doesn’t say that. In fact, he doesn’t introduce the show at all. We don’t even see Kermit onstage introducing anything until eight minutes into the first half.
In other words, welcome to the dying days of Season One, when the producers are still trying to figure the format of the show. Actually, what’s happening is that they’ve got the original format down cold by now — so they’re experimenting a little more, to see what else they can do.
So instead of opening with Kermit’s introduction, the episode starts backstage, where Kermit is spatting with a grumbling George. Then the stage door opens… and Valerie Harper walks up the stairs.
I don’t think I can overstate what a huge moment this is for the future of the show. Twenty episodes in, this is actually the very first time we’ve ever seen a guest star backstage. There was a brief scene with Lena Horne in her dressing room, but Valerie’s the first human to enter the main backstage set. It’s a small step for Rhoda, a huge leap for The Muppet Show.
Kermit welcomes her to the show, and tells her he’s glad she’s there. Valerie says she’s hoping he’ll let her do a big opening number for the show tonight. “Well,” Kermit says, “we had planned to open the show with Bertha Beasley and her Galloping Geese… but actually, uh, Bertha isn’t here yet, and the show’s about to start.”
Pssst, Kermit! The show started a minute and a half ago. This is one of the things I love best about The Muppet Show — this illusion that they’re essentially making the show up at the last minute, that things can go wrong, and they’ll have to ad-lib.
If you take this too literally, it’s a ludicrous idea that the guest star would arrive just as the show was starting, and negotiate to perform the opening number seconds before it’s about to begin. But somehow, the seat-of-the-pants illusion is so powerful, and the results are so funny, that you just go with it.
Valerie tells Kermit that Bertha’s not showing up: “I scotch-taped a bushel of birdseed to her body. Even as we speak, geese are pecking her into oblivion.” She’s determined to do the number, and asks for a chance to audition. Kermit says sure — so Valerie sings “Broadway Baby” right there, dancing up the stairs, ducking into the dressing rooms to do a series of quick costume changes.
She performs the entire number backstage, finishing with a pose on the stairs. The camera pulls back, and we see marquee lights ring the backstage — and the Muppet Show cast standing below her, applauding.
She never does go and perform the number “onstage” for the Muppet Theater’s audience. They just cut to Statler and Waldorf talking about Valerie as if they’ve seen her perform — even though the imaginary geography of the theater makes that impossible.
But the attitude here is, essentially, who cares? If you’ve seen the show so far, you already have a good sense of how it works — so they can casually violate the “rules” of the show, and it still holds together. From here, we can cut to a regular Swedish Chef spot and a News Flash gag, and the show just goes on.
Backstage, they’re still playing. Statler has decided he’s in love with Valerie Harper, so he leaves Waldorf in the balcony and visits backstage. He’s brought a plant for Valerie — a fast-growing African berry bush — and the story of the episode is that George keeps watering the plant, which grows out of control and takes over the whole room.
The fun thing about this is that for the rest of the episode, Waldorf is alone in the balcony. Left to his own devices, Waldorf makes faces to amuse himself and practices his flips. It’s a more gentle format tweak than Valerie’s impromptu opening — but it’s another example of the producers’ growing confidence in the show.
For the closing, we see Valerie talking to Kermit in her dressing room — another unusual season-one occurrence that’s about to become part of the show’s routine. She’s looking forward to her final dance number, but she’s a little nervous — it’s been a long time since she’s danced. Kermit goes to introduce her, and Valerie looks straight into the camera. “Hang in there, gang,” she tells us. “This could be the start of a new career… or the end of one.”
She doesn’t have to worry. It’s a great number. Valerie dances with the Clodhoppers — bumping into them, doing the wrong steps, hitting bad notes, and generally acting like she doesn’t know what she’s doing. It’s a perfect Muppet Show number — and over the next four years, we’ll be seeing lots more stuff like this.
This is definitely the start of something new.
by Danny Horn
