Transcript: Fraggle Talk: Back to the Rock – “The Great Radish Ball”

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Fraggle Talk: Back to the Rock – Episode 22: The Great Radish Ball

[Fraggle Talk theme music plays]

JOE HENNES: Hello and welcome to Fraggle Talk: Back to the Rock. The unofficial Fraggle Rock podcast, brought to you by ToughPigs.com.

This is the podcast where we cover Fraggle Rock: Back to the Rock episode by episode, along with the talented producers, performers, writers, and builders who helped put it all together. I’m your host, silly creature, Joe Hennes.

[Music ends]

JOE: Today, we are talking about season 2, episode 9, “The Great Radish Ball,” in which the Fraggles attend a party, and then the Fraggles attend a party, and then the Fraggles attend a party.

This week, we’ve got two special guests who I wouldn’t mind being caught in a time loop with. Our first guest is a puppeteer who worked on the original Fraggle Rock, and made the leap to Back to the Rock as the head of Pa Gorg, the body of Boober Fraggle, and the glue of Gluey Rudey, it’s Frank Meschkuleit. Hello, Frank!

FRANK MESCHKULEIT: Hey Joe, how’s it going?

JOE: So great. So great to have you here.

FRANK: Thank you, glad to be here.

JOE: Our second guest is the producer, writer, director, and performer whose credits on Back to the Rock are so long, we would need a time machine to make time to read them all. It’s John Tartaglia. Hello, John!

JOHN TARTAGLIA: I expected you to, Joe, but it’s fine. I’ll let it go. No. Hi! So glad to be here!

JOE: [laughs]

JOHN: Hello, hello.

JOE: So glad to have you both here. Thank you for making the time. That was a little time reference. There’s going to be a lot of those coming up.

JOHN: Ooooh.

FRANK: Oh, gosh.

JOE: Because this is a time loop story which, I did not expect Fraggle Rock to go there. Can you tell me, Johnny, how did this come up in the writer’s room as something that you guys wanted to tackle?

JOHN: Well, you know, we always begin in season by talking about general topics we want to cover, or world situations that we want to tip our hat to, or just, you know, big feelings that kids and parents might be going through.

And anxiety is something that is such a real thing that we all have, I think. Even those of us who don’t realize we’re anxious, I think we’re all anxious right now, because of the pandemic, because of the state of the world, because of a million different things. And so we talked a lot in the room about anxiety, and how we wanted to tackle that.

And then I don’t remember exactly where the idea of a time loop came from, but I know we thought it was really, really a cool way to show it. And it really came out of finding those, in episode two, on “The Twisty-Turny-Thon, when Red and Wembley find that tube, that spits them out into the Great Hall again. And we thought, how cool is it that there’s a system of tubes around Fraggle Rock.

We actually want to take that even further. We didn’t get a chance this season. But that idea that it kind of came back up for this episode, and we’re like, “Wait a minute, what if one of these tubes not only can take you anywhere in Fraggle Rock, but can also take you back in time?” And it’s some sort of, you know, we realize that that’s the magic of Fraggle Rock, because you don’t have to explain a whole lot of why something exists. It just does. And so that’s really kind of I think how we got there. And it just kind of snowballed from there.

JOE: Yeah, that is very Groundhog Day, not just in the theme of the time loop, but we don’t need to know why Bill Murray is repeating the day over and over again. We just need to know that he’s doing it.

JOHN: Yeah.

JOE: Do either of you have any favorite time loop stories aside from this episode, of course?

JOHN: Definitely Groundhog Day. I love that movie.

JOE: I mean, I feel like that’s the apex. Yeah.

FRANK: Yeah, for sure, Groundhog Day. And it’s interesting to take sort of that as a template and then see how it affects each of the characters. Because I think, I mean, in my opinion, anyway, this is a Boober episode. I think I’m right there.

JOHN: For sure.

FRANK: Definitely one of the more anxious characters on set. How does Boober react if he has the opportunity to live the same day over and over, you know? I’m sure there’s the usual, it begins with his panic, of course, but eventually it fits him like a suit, because he can control that span of time. And for once in his life, there is no variable. Nothing’s going to fall on his head. World isn’t going to collapse. Sky isn’t falling. He knows exactly what’s happening from A to Z.

And if something should come up, like he runs out of cake and he needs a little more, poof. Pops back. Comes back. This is Boobertown, man. Why would you ever leave?

[Joe laughs] 

JOHN: Yeah, that’s interesting. And it’s the control too, right. Like he’s such a control freak. And I think also to build one what Frank just said, we also really wanted to, we needed a way to really show the impact of what was about to come of the radish shortage. And the person who it would affect the most and make the most anxious, to Frank’s point, is Boober, who’s had some anxiety growth because of season one with “Flight of the Flutterflies,” but he still struggles with that.

JOE: And it certainly seems like Boober is not really allowed to have nice things. You know, we can’t actually give Boober a perfect day because his perfect day is always going to have something that kind of rains on his parade. Or even here, like he has the ability to create a perfect day. He can do it over and over again until it’s perfect and then have that perfection over and over again. But that is, for any of us, but especially Boober, a terrible, terrible idea.

JOHN: Yeah.

FRANK: It’s really telling earlier on when they have the first Great Radish Ball, like the real one, and they’re talking about it the next day. And Icy Joe comes in and says, “I looked high. I looked low. We’re out of radishes.” And Boober’s like, “Is this happening because I had a good night? Am I being punished?”

JOE: Yeah.

FRANK: Boober can’t accept a moment of quality in his life without questioning it or at least placing it in a context where it becomes a variable that is ultimately going to punish him somehow. So he’s anxious even when he’s not anxious. He’s preparing for a calamity.

JOE: Right. That’s kind of… Boober needs therapy, I think.

JOHN: [laughs] I love it too because, you know, it’s funny because we talked in the writers’ room about “Boober’s Quiet Day” from the original series. And just that feeling that we all think that like, “Oh, if we could just spend, you know, if I could just not go to work and stay at home all day by myself, do the things I want to do, I’d be so much happier.” Or if I could do A, B and C I’d be so much happier. And then if you get that opportunity, you actually realize, like you’re bored. You miss your friends. It’s scary without them. It’s not as fun as you thought it would be. So it’s kind of a little, you know, I think Boober learns that lesson a lot throughout the whole of Fraggle Rock.

JOE: Yeah, that’s true. Yeah.

FRANK: That’s a lesson that even me as an adult, you know, I learned that over and over. I’m my mother’s son. I worry about everything. And I spend a good deal of my present day worrying about things that I did in high school, which is, you know, as an adult, I process that a little more effectively. But the fact that I still spend a portion of each day thinking about what I should have done, I should watch this episode every day just to try and help me. Never mind Boober. [laughs]

JOE: It’s true.

JOHN: [laughs] Yeah, Boober needs therapy and you get therapy from Boober. [laughs]

[Joe laughs]

FRANK: Yeah, that’s right. Pass it through the arm. Excellent.

JOE: I do want to talk, Frank, with you a little bit about Boober. So, as people are most likely aware, you handle the puppetry for him while Dave Goelz handles the voice, which I assume comes later. You’re not dubbing to his voice live. He’s dubbing over your performance. Is that right?

FRANK: That is correct. Yes.

JOE: Has the whole process of basically having two performers share the duties for one puppet, has that whole process been streamlined or has it changed at all between seasons one and two?

FRANK: I think it’s fair to say that it’s a challenge in either season because of just what it is. Earlier, it’s one of my favorite stories, I think it’s from season one, I think I was doing World’s Oldest Fraggle, and I was working with Aymee [Garcia] who was, we were working side by side. I’m trying to figure it out. It’s my first time in the character, really. nd you know, the camera’s going and your brain’s buzzing. And I’m trying to figure out a read on a line and we’re trying to figure out how the characters interact.

And my phone buzzes. You know, and I’ve got it set to don’t buzz me except for certain people. And I look at my phone. It’s Dave Goelz. [laughs] And he sent me a text. He’s like, “Try putting the emphasis on this word.”

And suddenly this overwhelming wave hit me where I was like, “Oh gosh, he’s watching.”

[Joe laughs]

JOHN: We have a live feed for producers and Dave and whoever needs to watch, to watch if they want to.

FRANK: Yes. So the sudden awareness that Dave was looking at what I was doing was, on that day in particular, it just got smacked me. I was like, der, der, der. Because I’m trying to make… like, I’m a very good technician as a puppeteer. I’m trying to make good technical choices through the lens of what I think Dave would do with his character.

So there’s like a triple abstraction. Plus, you know, when they did the original Fraggle, Boober evolved over those seasons as well. So there was a challenge I didn’t anticipate that came up in that moment. And it has tapered. But I’m always aware of the fact that I want to do the character just as principally for all of the viewers.

And you know, Boober is one of my faves for sure. And also the honor to extend the legacy. You know, I want to bring the character into the present, which is a challenge because although I’m doing the vocalization, Dave’s dubbing it. And I know sometimes we have challenges getting our rhythms to match. But Dave’s such a gentleman. He’s been so patient with me and so kind. We spend a lot of time on Zoom chats the week before to talk about the script upcoming. And, that helped a lot. And I think the writers have found a stronger tone with Boober in season two.

But you know, I think one of the biggest thrills for me, Joe, is when we talked last time… Or no, you were interviewing Dave, excuse me. And I think you asked Dave, “What was it like to be back on set doing Boober?”

And I was like, “Oh, oh my goodness! That means I did it.”

JOE: That’s right. Yeah. Yeah, you fooled us all.

FRANK: So somebody close to the puppetry has went, “Okay, the performance was Boobery enough that it was working.” And as a footnote to that, I watched “Great Radish Ball” and all I could think of was the things that should have done differently. Just slight differences, you know, leans in and fingers up and things that I would like to have done differently. Going back to my earlier, you know, regrets.

I’m hoping for the next couple of seasons, I have a lot of ideas I want to bring to the table and a stronger separation between what I think Boober should be. And that sort of, that little jump I have to do between, okay, what do I think? What would Dave do? What would Dave have done then? What do people want Boober to do? I think I can clear some of that clutter away and make choices faster. And that’s going to be my focus when we come back.

JOE: And do you feel like you have more of an opportunity now that you’ve been working with the character for, now at the point of season two, over a year, to be able to insert more of yourself into the character? Or do you still feel like I’m here as an extension of Dave and that’s it?

FRANK: I think you can’t help but invest yourself in it, you know? If you don’t, you’re leaving something on the table. I happen to love props. Give me something I can pick up and I’ll find some business with it. I like pushing a broom. Like leaning on the broom. All the stuff that you can do with a prop is of great interest to me. And so if there’s, you know, there’s a props table and they’re like, “Take anything,” I’m going to grab something that I think I can get some mileage out of.

To your point, yeah, I think Boober is different. Now, here he is, he’s written at a different time as is this series, by different writers. It’s not Jerry Juhl, obviously anymore. I mean, because he’s passed away. Rest in peace. And there’s a different group of performers. And there’s a different tone in the world. So there will be changes with all the characters.

So yeah, I think you can’t help but invest yourself and at the same time pay the appropriate respect to the lineage of the character and the history of the character both story-wise and performance-wise. So like there’s a difference, like on the days when Traveling Matt comes to set and I do Traveling Matt when he’s in the rock, there is a big gear change between Boober and Matt, of course.

So, you know, I want the Boober to become more nuanced and the only way that’ll happen is through my process. And my process is different than Dave’s. So we’ll evolve together is what I think. I think that’s what’s happened and will continue.

JOHN: I agree with Frank and just to give him props on his props. Hey, look at that. Frank is a genius when it comes to figuring out a gesture that a character would make in the moment. How to plus it. You know, I think you always plus scenes so beautifully when it comes to, “What if I just pick up this thing? Or what if I do this point?” Like you’re saying. “Or what if I have a rig where Boober can put his hands down like he’s grabbing something and have a second Boober hand that has this sponge in it and then lift it up.”

And that adds this great texture to the character and I know Dave loves that stuff too because it’s something he would want to do if he was on set. And I think, to Frank’s point about the character evolving, you know, that’s one of the things I love about the original series too, is that over those four, five seasons, depending on how you watched it, those characters change and everyone remembers Boober to be this like world-fearing, depressing, downer character. I think that’s the person people think of for him.

And there’s certainly parts of that, you know, especially in the first season of Fraggle Rock, the original series. He is very kind of like, and I think it just became limited, right? Like we found it to be limiting in the first season of Back to the Rock. You could only write a character that’s got the negative point of view or got the down, or got the anxious point of view so much. And then you have to find the joy in that character too.

And I love, in the original series, how by the end of it, Boober was actually pretty, he still had his moments of fear and still had his moments of anxiety of course, but he celebrated his, you know, like the cooking and the joys of laundry and teaching laundry class to everybody. He just had this fun, like living in his nerdness, I guess you could say. And I think that that’s something we had fun with this season that Frank really excelled with, especially with the Radish Ball and with episode four. Oh my god, I’m blanking on it. The Radish Razzle and the repeatee birds, where Boober has this amazing cooking moment that he has where he’s flipping the radish and it’s smoking and he’s got his little outfit and stuff like that.

So, you know, it’s finding that joy. And I think that Frank brought a lot of those little details to the character on set. And so just to support what you were saying Frank, I think that you guys, you and Dave, add so much texture together from afar and make it a full character. And he’s just, I don’t know, I think he had so many shining moments this season. It was really nice to see that.

FRANK: It’s nice to hear, Johnny. I hope Dave feels the same way. I know that, in my mind too, I have a very minor legacy bridge to the original series because I was in the last season. I was in the Junior Gorg suit. And for me having this come full-circle has just been an extraordinary, extraordinary bit of luck and an honor.

And as challenging as it is to do a character with two people, with Dave dubbing the voice, I think that that bridge that Dave builds or connects to the original series, I think that gives our series here, it grounds it. And it grounds it in history and it grounds it in a reality.

Because as challenging as it is, and it is challenging to do someone else’s character and they’re going to dub the voice afterwards, it’s also challenging to inherit a legacy character, Johnny, like with Gobo. It takes time to settle in your mind and in your spirit that you are doing justice to the original character and also infusing it with enough presence that it doesn’t feel like an echo, but it feels like a real thing.

So, you know, hats off to you there, Johnny.

JOHN: Thank you, pal.

FRANK: And to Donna [Kimball] too, and Jordan [Lockhart] I mean, we’re all facing a different sort of challenge with a project that has such enormity and such value and watching Radish Ball again, I’m reminded how current this series is. It really has to do with now and how quickly the half hour goes by because it’s so well cut and strongly performed. And it’s so energetic. And the sets are so epic and there’s so much to move through. It’s a pretty darn terrific series. [laughs]

JOHN: Yeah, if we do say so ourselves. [laughs]

FRANK: Yeah.

JOE: Well, as someone who did not work on the series, I can confirm, it’s a great series.

FRANK: Thanks, Joe.

JOHN: Thanks, Joe.

JOE: Yeah, you guys can toot your own horn. That’s perfectly fine, but I will also toot your horn.

JOHN: Beep, beep.

JOE: That all the things you said are absolutely correct. And Frank, I think you’re 100% right that having the connection between you and Dave and Karen [Prell] and Jocelyn Stevenson, all, you know, back from the original series, working on the new one, keeps things from feeling like, you know, we’re trying to do a carbon copy or we’re trying to do like a sequel that takes place 20, 30, 40 years later.

And it’s like, no, no, no, this is just more of the same. Certain things are updated, and you all keep the integrity of that alive. And so, if there was going to be, you know, more, I’m thinking way in the future, where we don’t have that connection to the original series anymore, now we’ve got all these folks who’ve worked on Back to the Rock who really know what it’s like to be part of what Fraggle Rock represents and what it should be.

And I think any Fraggle project moving forward is going to have an element of that. Lucky for us and really keep that integrity of the franchise alive.

JOHN: Well, thank you. I just want to say, Joe, to your point, maybe this is like a broken record, because I probably have said this a million times before, but it’s very, very, very true, which is that there is no one on that set on Back to the Rock who had the hubris or the arrogance to say, “We’re going to make this better than the original or we know more.”

I think that everyone, and I’m literally just cycling through every person I can think of who worked on the show, every single person either watched the original series growing up and had an incredible awe and respect for it or, and/or, understood the legacy that came before and understood the quality that was expected. And I think everyone felt this incredible responsibility to honor that.

And so I think that’s, I’d like to think that’s why it works so well, it’s because unlike a lot of reboots that are out there, there was no Hollywood attitude of, “Pfft. We don’t need to do what they did before. We don’t need to respect those choices.” The canon of the show was so beautifully respected.

And if we made a change to the canon, which happened, we had to and wanted to, it was done with a lot of thought and weight. I wish, in the entertainment world we live in now, where there are so many reboots and there are so many reimagining of things, I wish that happened more often. Because nothing upsets me more as a fan of someone else’s property, then to go in and be like they didn’t care at all about what we all loved about it for the first time.

JOE: But here’s the thing about any franchise that’s going to do this kind of jump to a new series, is you’re either trying to do what the original did best and maybe trying to one up it, or you’re just going to be chasing your tail and you’re just going to be, you know, the reason that we still talk about it is because it was great back then. It was so good we want to do it again.

JOHN: That’s right.

JOE: And you can’t just recapture magic. That’s impossible. I think that’s why when we’re looking at Disney and they have all these great animated movies that they’re now remaking as live action, like the animated movie was so good because the stars aligned.

JOHN: Yep.

JOE: You can’t just get force that again for a straight remake. And there’s something about Back to the Rock that, I think this is going to take a lot more thought and we could definitely talk about this for another hour, but that you’re not doing either. You’re not trying to be better, obviously, than the original but you’re not trying to be the original and to try to match the quality. You’re doing your own thing while keeping true to what the original series was. And I honestly can’t think of any other rebooted franchise that’s done it in the way that you all are handling it here.

JOHN: Thank you. I’ll just say one last thing because I know that you want to move on. I’ll just say the other thing too, we also when we recast the characters, myself included as Gobo, you know, I got to take that on 11 years ago with the first thing I did, but it’s never been about matching a voice.

And it’s never just been about being a soundalike. It’s really about who has the heart of that character. Jordan Lockhart has the heart of Wembley and understands who that character is from the inside out and happens to be a very close voice match. Donna Kimball as Mokey happens to have that. And we all…Dan Garza as Junior. Aymee as Marjory which is probably the biggest change we made, if you think about it. It was about who has that heart and who starts– And I think heart is what carries this show and the original through is coming from a place of heart.

JOE: I couldn’t agree more. Well all that said, we’re talking a lot about bringing the series full circle and speaking a full circle…

JOHN: Like a time loop? [laughs]

JOE: Like a time loop!

JOHN: See what we did there? We brought it back. We brought it back.

JOE: It was a bit of a forced segue, but we got there. So let’s talk about this episode. We open in Gobo and Wembley’s cave. They are preparing for the Radish Ball and they’re wearing some incredible outfits. We have to talk about these costumes. Gobo’s got this like sparkly red vest. He’s got a bow tie that looks like it’s made out of moss. Love that. He’s wearing a hat. It kind of looks like a radish or a pot, something like that. Is this an outfit that we saw–

JOHN: A radish top hat.

JOE: It’s like a top hat. Yeah, yeah. Is it a hat that we saw in the “Radishes Versus Strawberries” number or is this like original, this is Gobo’s hat?

JOHN: No. Actually all these outfits were made just for this episode.

JOE: Cool.

JOHN: And actually, that outfit you’re talking about with Gobo is what he wore, except for the top hat, he wore to the Emmys because the Emmys last season happened to be at the same time as we were shooting this episode. So we got to go down and wear it.

JOE: Oh that’s great.

JOHN: Yeah.

JOE: And he already had the bow tie. I love that for him.

JOHN: Yeah.

JOE: Wembley is, he’s got his hair in the side ponytail like in the “I’m Pogey” episode. I’m really glad to see that continued through here. That’s something that’s going to, that he’s going to choose to do every so often.

JOHN: That was very important to us that it becomes a part of his character and that we don’t ever make it a gimmick. That it’s literally just now it’s a part of his texture. We felt like that was really important to that episode. That wearing the outfit he’s wearing, wearing the side pony that it’s just a part of who he is now and we don’t point it out. We don’t make a big thing about it. We just, that’s Wembley.

JOE: Yeah I love that. I love this for him. He’s also wearing like, is it a kimono? Is it a robe? I don’t know but I mean it’s great. It’s not quite the banana tree pattern. But it’s also not like Mokey’s old gray robe that we saw in “I’m Pogey.” It’s definitely something new with like a red frilly skirt.

JOHN: Yeah.

JOE: It’s a mishmash of things and that’s perfect for Wembley.

JOHN: It’s our amazing, amazing, amazing puppet builders and designers who came up with all these outfits. I love watching this episode because of that. They all just look spectacular.

JOE: They’re absolutely killing it in this episode. I really do want to talk about every single costume we see and we don’t have time for that. But like every one these outfits is great. I highly recommend anyone who’s watching this one, again, Pa’s it a lot and just look.

JOHN: Yeah. We said that this episode had to be Fraggle prom. That’s kind of how we looked at it.

JOE: Fraggle prom.

JOHN: It was Harry Potter. You know, the Yule Log Ball and it was like in our case the Fraggles if they had a prom like thing that’s what the Radish Ball is.

JOE: I want to go to a Fraggle prom.

JOHN: Right? Who doesn’t?

JOE: Right. [laughs] Boober comes in and he’s also dressed amazing. He’s got like a sparkly purple jacket. He’s wearing like a radish brooch. And he’s feeling really positive about the ball which seems to give him anxiety, so he comments on the fact that the cave could collapse on them at any moment and that seems to like bring him back down to earth.

And I can’t tell if this is Boober practicing like self-care or if this is like a cyclical like Boober, no you can’t don’t do this to yourself buddy. Cause he seems happier afterward but also like that seems destructive somehow.

FRANK: I always get the feeling that Boober can’t have a good moment without acknowledging that it’s temporal. It could go at any second. This could all fall apart. So I’m willing to accept this quality moment with the understanding that I’m going to take a step backwards and fall through a hole and it’ll all be over.

JOHN: Yeah, totally.

FRANK: Which is perfect for this episode where he can get to a place where he can control the entire evening.

JOE: Yeah.

JOHN: I love a bit of realism. [laughs]

JOE: Right. [laughs] Oh and then also Gobo, he kind of pops out and back in and he’s wearing a bright red cape. That’s the last part of his outfit. And okay, so there’s a thing that you do here, Johnny, where you spin and you say that the cape spins real nice. Are you referring to the fact that the cape flows when you spin or the cape is making Gobo spin?

JOHN: Oh I think I was referring to the fact that the cape like, he loves the fact that when he turns the cape has this like twirl to it.

JOE: Okay.

JOHN: So I think he was acknowledging its gift.

JOE: For some reason, the first time I watched it, I was like, is it like giving him like slick shoes? Because your spin is so smooth. That makes so much more sense than whatever was going on in my brain.

JOHN: Yeah, I think he’s just like look at it. Look how it catches the wind. He just thinks it looks amazing.

JOE: I love that. We get our first check in with Doc and Sprocket here. They have built a pillow fort and Doc says that it feels like a vacation. Or should she say, vay-cushion. A little bit of wordplay from Doc.

JOHN: Dun, dah, dah, dah, dah.

JOE: She’s got a lot going on between work and school and she wishes that she could just stay in the fort forever or should she say, fort-ever.

JOHN: Dun, dah, dah, dah, dah.

JOE: They’re getting worse.

JOHN: We need like a rim shot drummer on this episode for sure.

JOE: Maybe Sprocket needs to learn the drums so that he could do a little rimshot for her.

JOHN: He probably could.

JOE: He could do it. He’s got opposable thumbs.

JOHN: I think Lilli Cooper is so good in this episode. She’s so funny and so charming in this episode.

JOE: She really is. And like there’s something, maybe it’s the fact that she’s like all cozy in her pajamas, but there’s something like cuddly about her in this episode.

JOHN: Yes.

JOE: It’s just like maybe I just want to be in the pillow fort with her.

JOHN: Yeah. I think she’s the perfect, to me Lilli is the perfect blend of like, you totally buy that she’s the scientific, PhD person who’s super smart, but has this wonderful, lovable geeky energy where it’s like exactly, you just want to like you want to watch a nerd movie with her.

JOE: Yes.

JOHN: And just like nerd out with her all afternoon. She’s just the best.

FRANK: Totally. Totally. She’s also one of the fastest actors I’ve seen. We’ve been on set and entire scenes get rewritten on the floor sometimes. Sometimes it’s a very nuanced change. Sometimes it’s an out and out change.

“Like this is out. We liked our first version better. We haven’t showed it to you. Here it is, Lilli. Can you do it?” And she’ll read it and we’ll shoot it and she’ll nail it every time.

JOHN: Yeah.

FRANK: So also I just want to comment on this, because when I watched the Radish Ball the second time, there’s a scene where when Doc decides to stay in the pillow fort for the day. And she winds up with a run and jumps in the air to fall into the cushions. She literally does a tuck. She pulls her legs, her knees up and she’s in the air with her heels on her butt and her knees in front of her and falls into it. And I just thought, that’s commitment. That’s commitment.

JOE: Yeah.

JOHN: Yeah.

FRANK: You know, I would have just kind of went, “Nyeheh,” and fallen into it like a giant stick insect. Right?

[John laughs]

FRANK: But she’s like, this is what Doc does. I’m excited. I’m going to jump in the air, gonna tuck my knees in. It was beautiful. And Lilli did that all the time.

JOE: I was going to ask about that because I was wondering if there’s like extra padding underneath like she knew that she was safe to jump in.

JOHN: Yeah.

JOE: Or if she was just like screw it. It’s Fraggle Rock. You gotta commit. If I get hurt, I get hurt.

JOHN: I think it was both. I mean, I think to Frank’s point, she commits so strongly to everything. I mean, you know, we did, 26, no, 27 episodes together and I can literally think of one time, and I’m not kidding, one time she hung up on a line. She’s just so good and such a, like Frank was saying, such a quick memorizer. By the way, also while navigating open pits next to her where the puppeteers are.

FRANK: Oh, yes.

JOHN: She could fall four feet and props and everything. No teleprompter, nothing. All just in her mind. But yeah, I think there was probably like a crash cushion underneath those couple of pieces would be my guess. But also wouldn’t surprise me if she just went for it because that is her.

JOE: Amazing. And then also I have to mention that immediately after she does her cannonball, Sprocket also does a cannonball.

JOHN: [laughs] Yes.

JOE: And like, okay, so obviously, he’s a puppet. I’m sorry everybody. We have to admit this truth that Sprocket is a puppet. That like you just yeeted him and just tossed him. But he’s like folded in a way…like he’s also kind of doing the whole like knee tuck, you know, whatever.

JOHN: Yup.

JOE: So how do you take a puppet that, you know, normally has a hole for your arm or whatever and then not armatured because he’s got to be performable and get him to be in that position for such a quick shot?

JOHN: Well, we have multiple versions of all the characters. So I think now we have, I might be making this up, but I think we have like two hero versions of each character. That’s at least for the Fraggles. One stunt version that usually stays armatured. So they usually have, you know, armature wire inside all their limbs, inside their body and head so we can pose them. For when we throw them or when we need to like, you know, switch them out really quickly or they fall into a shot and then stand back up. And then there’s the swim version for the Fraggles.

But for a Sprocket, we have two hero versions and then we have a stunt version. And so to answer your question, he had armature wire put throughout his entire body that our amazing puppet wranglers put in and so we could pose him. So we basically just posed his legs in kind of similar to what Lilli did so we could match that.

And then, my two favorite things in the world are when I get to throw a puppet or I get to put a puppet in water. I just love it so, so much. So I was so happy to be able to throw him and that was so much fun.

JOE: That’s great. It actually makes me think of, there’s not a lot of puppets in the water in this season. I guess you know last season there was so much about the water.

JOHN: Yeah.

JOE: But do you miss that? Do you miss kind of getting up into the tank?

JOHN: I do. I really do. And because when I was a kid, the thing I was always most fascinated by and would try to replicate in my home with my kiddie pool, disastrous effects, or my bathtub was the Fraggles in water. I was fascinated. How do they do it? How did the water not leak out? Why don’t I see the puppeteer? How do they do the switch out of the puppet, the throw puppet going through the air and then the puppet coming up and splashing. Now I know it was all camera tricks but I didn’t know that.

So I’ve always been obsessed with it. So yes, I was obsessed and they only had like two episodes where they were in the water and you know I, as Frank will tell you, I love those days. I love water days. Even though they are very hard to do. They’re really hard to do.

JOE: Yeah.

JOHN: Because it’s hard on the puppeteers through the thing, through the pond, but also for the crew and for our puppet wranglers. Puppets get heavy. They’re foam. They’re foam and fur and fleece. So when you take them out of the water they weigh like 80 pounds. [laughs] They’re so heavy.

[Joe laughs]

JOHN: So it’s a hard day for everybody else. But little Johnny’s under there like, Woohoo! I love it.

FRANK: It should be pointed out as well, Johnny, while we all had our opportunity to go under the pond and stick our hand into a soaking wet puppet and take it on and off a few times, only one of us donned a wetsuit and got in the water multiple times, and that’d be you, Johnny.

I think Karen Prell went in once for a Red shot. But that water, leave water on its own, it never really gets warm. You know, the lights are off. They don’t heat the place at night generally, too well. But Johnny was in, man. And you know I put my finger in there a few times. I was like, yeah, I could put my soda pop in there and chill that for lunch.

[John laughs]

FRANK: Instead, just throw John in. Let him warm up the water a bit.

JOHN: I loved it. 

FRANK: You were that guy.

JOHN: I was that guy. I might have almost gotten hypothermia the first season because of it, but that’s another story. We’re talking about season two. But it was really, really fun to do that. So more water in the future. 

JOE: Great. Great. If only for you, if not for season three story, blah, blah, blah.

JOHN: [laughs] My own personal pond in my apartment at home.

JOE: Exactly.

FRANK: To continue the legacy of discomfort, John Tartaglia will now don his wetsuit once again. Let’s throw another bucket of ice in there for him.

JOHN: [laughs] Yes.

JOE: I imagine, John, that you like go home and you’re like, I just really miss doing this. Let me just fill up the bathtub. Grab a puppet.

FRANK: Ice plunge. Where’s my puppet?

[Joe laughs]

JOHN: [laughs] Exactly. 

JOE: Just so I can have that experience one more time.

JOHN: Take me back to Calgary!

FRANK: Please.

JOE: In the great hall, the Fraggles are all decorating for the big Radish Ball. There are streamers and there’s all these towers of pastries. And again, we were talking about the costumers but the sets and props people also huge, huge kudos to them. They’re really outdoing themselves. It really does, as you said, it feels like a fraggle prom.

And I especially got to point out all these pastries and cakes and stuff because, I know there’s a couple of pictures online that people have uploaded to social media that are now on the Muppet Wiki. And just to see the detail in them. Like you guys could have done anything. Could have been just whipped cream on a plate. We wouldn’t have asked any questions but they really did.

JOHN: I want to give props. I’m so glad you mentioned this because they don’t always get the praise that the puppeteers do and get the attention. But Kesar Lacroix and her team who did all the props this season, they spent so many hours making detailed, gorgeous food that really did look like it was real. And I mean, up close. Up close you’d be like, my god that looks like an actual jello radish. It was so well done and so beautiful and they cared so deeply and it kills me, that because of the pace of the show you don’t really get a chance to ever, like you were saying, sit and look at it. And there’s stuff that’s in the background that they spent eight hours to make one little radish souffle that you see for half a second.

JOE: Yep.

JOHN: But just that level of detail and that want for the world to feel real. And the art direction. You would be surprised how many meetings happened about streamers and about what a radish ball lantern would look like and you know, the radish disco ball. Does it have to be this shape or this color? You know, there’s just so much thought that goes into it. All them are geniuses. They really are.

JOE: I’m glad you mentioned the radish disco ball. That is easily the best prop in this episode. Good god that is gorgeous and you see it for a whole half a second. But it’s amazing.

JOHN: I know. I want to know where it ended up. I feel like Frank might know. But I feel like Tyler Harron, our production designer, took it home or something like that. Because that thing was heavily sought after. Everyone wanted that thing.

FRANK: Yeah, yeah. We could have raffled that off and, you know, doubled our budget right there, I think.

[Joe laughs]

JOHN: Paid for season three right there. Yeah.

JOE: So. Boober tells Mokey that he needs one more radish to finish his cake topper which is kitchen lingo for the thing you put on a cake. I love that little bit. In case you didn’t know what a cake topper was, Boober’s here to explain it to you. And then I’m here to explain the joke to you so that you understand. It makes it funnier when I get to explain jokes. Always.

JOHN: [laughs] Exactly.

FRANK: We should submit a new term called Muppetsplain instead of mansplain.

JOE: Yes, we’re Muppetsplaining.

[crosstalk]

JOHN: Muppetsplain. Yeah.

JOE: Mokey is now short one radish, so Icy Joe volunteers to go on a radish run for her. She doesn’t mind missing part of the ball because she’s a terrible dancer anyway. And we see her dance. And, you know, I don’t think when you all are performing as puppeteers there’s ever a moment where I think, God that looks like a puppet. But this is the one shot, where it truly looks like there’s four different people who are all performing Icy Joe and they have not spoken to each other about what these movements are going to be.

Every limb is doing something else. Her eyes are doing this weird thing up and down. I think it’s hysterical but very much like…

JOHN: Do you want a fun fact about this moment?

JOE: I want so many fun facts about this but yes.

JOHN: So I was sitting in my trailer watching the feed and I was, I think I was getting changed or something like that anyway, and I was watching it and it was actually too good. It looked too good because there are all such incredible puppeteers on Icy Joe. I want to think it was Ben Durocher, Ellis Lalonde, Ingrid Hansen, Kira Hall, Andrew Cooper, who was on it. Karen Prell, of course.

And anyway, they are all so good that it looked too coordinated. And I got to give the greatest note I’ve ever gotten to give as puppet captain. Which is I got to run out on set, like, you know what? It needs to look horrible. Can you do this? It was so fun to be like, do your worst. Basically, to your point.

JOE: Yeah.

JOHN: Do the most uncoordinated thing you can do because they’re such a good team. They make Icy Joe look so good for this giant rigged puppet. That was one of my favorite memories of that moment was to be like, (laughing) can you make it look horrible which is not usually the note you get.

JOHN: It reminds me of a story I read in a book by Geoff Emerick who was engineer for a bunch of the Beatles songs. And I can’t remember which song it was but there’s one of the Beatles’ songs where like it just sounds like an orchestra cacophony. And so they got the orchestra for Abbey Road to come in, they said just play anything, just make it sound bad. Whatever.

And they start playing and it’s beautiful. And they had to say, “No, actually we really need you to play poorly.” And they all said, “We don’t know how.” Because they’re these classically trained musicians. And you know, Abbey Road was not, I mean that was not a rock and roll studio. It was like they played classical music there. And so the Beatles had to come in and like teach them, okay here’s what we want you to do. Random notes and like scratch it and this and that and whatever.

JOHN: Yeah.

JOE: And that’s the same with Fraggle puppeteers. Like you’re classically trained puppeteers. How do you make it bad?

JOHN: It works against every instinct you have, right? You get your hand slapped when you’re learning how to puppeteer when you aren’t coordinated and you’re not together. And it just gets in your body. So I think it was really fun for everyone to be like, we really can be that uncoordinated and that bad? It’s like, “Yes, go for it.”

JOE: Yes, go nuts. [laughs] Be bad. I wish someone would pay me to be bad at my job.

JOHN: Right?

JOE: I’d thrive at that. Which you know, I’d lose my job because I’m too good at it.

JOHN: I don’t think I actually could.

JOE: Yeah. So Icy Joe just needs to change out of her formal clothes and get into her radish gathering clothes. And this is also one of my favorite jokes where she just pops off her bow tie and she’s ready to go. Hysterical.

FRANK: She’s ready to get her hands dirty just had to take that bow tie off.

JOE: Exactly. Speaking of getting dirty, this is where we check in with the gorgs’ garden. The strawberries all seem to be rotting. The gorgamax is absorbing all the water or something like that and just poisoning all these strawberries. So Pa Gorg has some sage advice for us. Keep doing the same thing over and over. Never change. Double down.

FRANK: (in voice of Pa Gorg) Double down. (in normal voice) Yeah.

JOE: [laughs] Good advice. So Frank this is our one real shot of Pa Gorg here, who you perform the face and voice for. How do you feel about Pa’s evolution through this season where he kind of starts being friends with the Fraggles and then he goes back and he doesn’t like the Fraggles and you know where it goes in there. But how did you feel about all this?

FRANK: You know, I think as much as Boober could use some therapy, I think Pa should never leave. [laughs] He should sit down on that couch and just bring a sandwich because he’s going to be there a while. You know, Pa is all about end result. And process is just a consequence of getting to the thing for him.

And I love that about Pa because in my own life, earlier especially, process was something that I also had a challenge with. I wasn’t interested in the path. I just wanted to get to the destination. And over time and a lot of introspection I found a way to realize that the path was it. The destination was just the start of the next path.

So to see Pa just screaming out, (in voice of Pa Gorg) Double down. Never change. (in normal voice) I just like, oh man I know where you’re at, you poor guy.

[Joe laughs]

FRANK: And Junior’s his willing accomplice. And I just enjoy doing Pa a lot. I think it was really exciting to see it all fall apart in season two. There’s a… we can give…There’s no spoiler damage.

JOE: No, no, I just assume everyone has seen the whole thing. But yeah, feel free.

JOHN: They better have.

JOE: Yeah. If not, Pa’s. Go watch the whole season. Come back. We’ll be here when you’re ready.

FRANK: That’s right. You guys know there are other episodes than this one, right? Okay, good.

[John and Joe laugh]

FRANK: So to see it begin to unravel for Pa and he’s still fighting it. He’s oblivious to the, you know, until there’s no other way. I can relate so I enjoyed Pa’s transition in season two particularly. I think he caught, he really caught traction. All the gorgs did in season two. And that cliffhanger, man. I mean, that’s pretty exciting stuff for me and I’m already visualizing. You know what we could do? We could, Ma could be holding the baby but it would be Ingrid’s hand inside and we could.

JOE: Oh yeah.

FRANK: Ways to make that work when we come back to shoot that. And I’m dying to see what the writers do with Pa’s arc after that. Because he’s for the first time in his life, maybe when his PaPa was alive he was second banana but he’s…How long has been alive? 600 years or something.

JOHN: More probably.

FRANK: Yeah. Junior’s around six. So let’s call it a thousand. I don’t know off the top of my head. Someone will know and let us know. But Pa’s used to being on top and having the bottom drop out on him, I’m dying to see what he does with that.

JOE: Well and talking about both what he says in this episode and again looking at his arc through the season which is hardly an arc because he is, everything about him is, don’t change. And even when there is change thrust upon him after this, at the end of season one, he goes right back to his status quo.

And that’s another reason why we need a season three is because once again change will be thrust upon him by the big revelation, by Ma Gorg’s big revelation. And I am so curious to see what that will look like for him and to see what, he’s the immovable object and he’s got to move. So what happens to Pa?

FRANK: What else is interesting is with that transition of the power hierarchy. A) I think it’s very topical. You know, I’d love to put women in charge of everything like at my house.

[John laughs]

FRANK: So how is that going to play out and how will the dynamic between Pa and Junior change because Junior is his own soul, right? But he’s Pa’s minion in a way as well.

JOE: That’s right.

FRANK: So what’s going to happen? Is Junior going to find more independence of thought. I suspect he will. What’s Pa going to do in isolation? Is he going to get so lonely that he befriends the loneliest Fraggle? I’m writing it in my head right now, John. Don’t worry.

[John laughs]

FRANK: It would be really interesting to see Pa do a full 180 and come around to realizing that I’m nothing without somebody, you know.

JOE: Yeah.

JOHN: I think, to Frank’s point, that the gorgs all had some sort of growth this season and that was purposeful because one of the things we walked away from season one in the writers’ room with was that Pa kind of existed on one level for most of the first season. And part of that was because he had to and part of it was just the time to address. It’s hard to carry all these different stories at once, right? And make sure everyone has a full arc the whole season.

But also, you know, Fraggle Rock doesn’t have a villain. They tried that in the original series with Wander McMooch and those characters. It’s really hard to write a villain for Fraggle Rock that you want to spend time with. And Pa is representational of there are people out there in this very polarized society we live in today, that are very scared of change and very scared of what they know. And to your point Joe, they might take a step forward but then the minute that fear sets in, they take three steps back.

And that’s kind of who Pa is. And we really discussed, this is actually what Frank played so beautifully for the whole season, we discussed very heavily in the room about generational trauma. And how we tend to carry on the things that our parents taught us that they may not even be aware that they processed or didn’t process that just gets passed on.

And, you know, that there’s this awakening happening in culture which I think is wonderful. We don’t have to keep those things going. We can be much more aware, much more responsible of the trauma that we’re carrying on or not carrying on. And I think Pa represents that so beautifully. And I think, even the moment, I know there was some criticism…

I read some criticism, Joe, on ToughPigs, about this moment.

JOE: From who? From me? No. Couldn’t be.

JOHN: It wasn’t from you. It was that Jarrod Fairclough. No, I’m kidding. I don’t know who it was.

JOE: Ah!

JOHN: No, but someone mentioned, and I understand, that like even his his change, I think it’s in the next episode or the episode after, when he gives up the book to help the windmill. I think it’s two episodes later. It felt so out of nowhere. And part of that’s just again, time. It’s just time in making things. But also, that is how things happen sometimes. Sometimes people have, they just, the light bulb goes on. And you’ve got to catch it in that moment.

JOE: Yep.

JOHN: So he’s a suspiciously complicated character who’s fun to write for and hard to write for because he has to have some redeeming qualities that you want to spend time with him. And you don’t want it to feel like he’s only mentally abusing Junior. And you don’t want it to feel like he’s only dismissive of his wife. And I love where it gets to at the end of the season that Ma’s like, “Oh, hell no. I’m in charge.” I love that. And, like Frank said, it would be a better world if that was the case, (laughing) I think.

JOE: Well, and I think talking about Pa basically exists in this point in time to sort of antagonize both Junior and Ma. And to another extent, the Fraggles. And if there’s a new baby frag–Excuse me, a new baby gorg coming up in season three. I can’t imagine you guys are going to have him antagonize a baby. Like that just seems kind of a little bit too far even for him. And so I think, by default, we’re going to have to see a softer side of him than compared to seasons before.

JOHN: (in normal voice) And the family structure changes, right?

JOE: Yeah.

JOHN: That’s what I’m excited about. Because it’s like Frank was saying, who does Junior become now? When you’re not the baby anymore. I had that experience in my life. When you’re not the baby anymore, it changes. When that attention that always gets put on you is not put on you anymore, when Pa, you know, depending on if it’s a boy baby or girl baby, you know how Pa relates to either his new son or a daughter for the first time. And Ma with all the responsibility of taking care of that baby.

So it’s really interesting. We knew it was a massive change in the canon. We were frankly really like, I was petrified to be honest with you when that episode dropped. I was like, Oh my god. How are people going to react? This is probably the biggest change we have ever made. And, you know what? I love how many people were excited about it. Because I think it’s going to open a whole world of new story and make this family tighter ultimately.

FRANK: Yeah.

JOE: Yeah and again, we’ve talked a lot about the status quo and maybe it’s good that we don’t have such a strict status quo. We’ve seen it. We’ve done that. Let’s play with it.

JOHN: Let it evolve. 

JOE: And see what else these characters can do in a new environment with new characters, new interactions.

JOHN: Yep.

JOE: That might be one of the themes of this episode too. Hmmm.

JOHN: What?

JOE: As the gorgs are doing whatever it is that they’re doing in the garden, we see like kind of a laser cut out around one of these rotten strawberries. And it drops down into the soil. It’s the doozers. They’re manufacturing these rotten strawberries. And Cotterpin and the Architect are there. Cotterpin really misses making things, constructing things. And the Architect says, “Let me be frank with you. And I don’t mean the silly character I sometimes do called Frank.”

[John and Frank laugh]

JOE: Hysterical. I’ve been seeing this a lot when you’re not on this podcast, Johnny, but like there’s all these lines for the Architect or for Barry Blueberry that I’m like, “That must have been an ad lib.” And they’re like, “Nope, that was in the script.” And like this one like, it seems like okay, they obviously wrote something that’s so in your voice. And I mean the writers are just killing it with your characters.

JOHN: Yeah.

JOE: It’s great.

JOHN: Frank was in the script. Ironic that we’re talking with Frank. And it was just a character that they came up with. And I think season two, they were so on to Donna and I and our ad libs in between takes that kind of really influenced who Architect and Cotterpin have become, that they just had so much fun in the room. We had so much fun, I should say, in the room writing for them. And to Frank’s point, so many things get rewritten on set and some of those moments even though they may have been thought of on the set, were still written by the writers. Because Matt and Alex especially are so on top of it.

But yeah, I love this. I think it’s such a random thing. I just love poor Cotterpin’s like, Jesus Christ. (laughing) I gotta put up with this guy all the time.

[Joe laughs]

FRANK: You know, the first time I saw contemporary animation, like, let’s say Aladdin or something, where the illustrators would go into the sound recording to watch the voice performers do the thing. I’m thinking about Robin Williams because he’s particularly animated. And that kind of performance informs the writers and the illustrators how to make the character work. And Johnny and Donna have a lovely habit of before we shoot any big doozer scene, it’s always Cotterpin and Architect talking, mainly Architect. And he’s like, (in voice of older, British gentleman) “You know a Cotterpin.” (in normal voice) Of course that’s my perfect impersonation of you, Johnny.

JOE: Nailed it.

FRANK: And you’d just go on a tear about nothing or something. It would be something ridiculous and Donna, all deadpan, “Mmhmm, yeah. Oh yeah, I remember that. Uh-huh”

JOHN: “Tell me more about that, sir.” Yeah.

FRANK: We all looked forward to that because it was so silly. And there was a consistency to it to the point where that became the defining characteristics of their relationship. And of course the writers picked up on that. And it was a lovely moment that we always looked forward to at the top of a doozer scene.

JOHN: I think we just enjoyed giving Architect non sequiturs. Like he’s held a lot of jobs that we don’t know how he’s had these jobs. Donna Kimball said like, we had like two wheels that would spin in my brain or her brain, where it was like a celebrity and a former job. And it was something that Architect was connected to.

So it would be like, (in voice of Architect) “Did I ever tell you, Cotterpin, about the time I was Joe Pesci’s back hair waxer?”

[Joe laughs]

JOHN: (in normal voice) And she’d always be like, “No, sir. You didn’t.” And then Donna would do the most brilliant improv thing, she’d say, “Tell me more about that, sir.” And then put me back in the hot seat. I was like, crap. But it was just fun to, I think those Doozer scenes are really hard to shoot.

They’re really hard to shoot. It’s hard on a crew. It’s hard on the camera department. It’s hard on the puppeteers because they’re stuck under the Doozer dome which is low and hot. And everyone just needs those moments of laughter to try to keep the energy up. So yeah, it was never a problem to ask me and Donna to play. [laughs]

JOE: My favorite thing on this podcast, any time we bring up Cotterpin and the Architect, whoever I’m interviewing says the same exact thing that you guys were just talking about. About like, there’s this great improv thing that they do and everyone always gives an example.

JOHN: Oh no.

JOE: And every single time it’s been something completely different. “Did I ever tell you about the time I was…” and then it’s something. No one’s repeated. It’s incredible. I think we need to fit that into an episode at some point. I don’t know how you could do it.

JOHN: Yeah. Or just make two giant Wheel of Fortune wheels with like pies of Charo’s makeup advisor. Just whatever. They just line up and you just go for it.

JOE: Yep. Perfect. [laughs]

FRANK: [laughs] I’d watch that.

JOE: Yeah. The Architect tells Cotterpin that they’ve got to change with the times. They can’t just keep constructing. They’ve got to be making things too which is the opposite of what Pa was just saying. Which I love that these two scenes come so close to each other that Pa says, “Don’t change.” And Architect is, “You have to change.” And of course by the end of this season we’re going to see well, there’s both. Obviously you have to change but you can’t just get rid of all the things that you need or the things that make us great.

JOHN: That’s right.

JOE: We’ll get back to all that stuff soon enough. But as they’re having this conversation, we cut back to the Architect and he’s wearing glasses and a second mustache over his mustache.

JOHN: Yes.

JOE: He’s Frank now. And I gotta say, Frank, he looks just like you. I can tell with your glasses and your mustache. Obviously this was supposed to be you.

FRANK: I’m talking to lawyers right now, Joe. I can’t really comment on that.

[Joe and John laugh]

JOHN: Listen, Frank, you signed the contract that says we could use your image and likeness at any moment.

FRAN: That’s a funny bit. It’s a funny bit, the double mustache.

JOE: It’s so good. I love that it’s not commented on.

JOHN: Yeah it’s not commented on and it comes out of nowhere. It’s just on the cut, all the sudden he has it for no reason whatsoever.

JOE: Yeah. Yeah, he’s just Frank.

FRANK: I want to point out as well how well it works that the two of them, they do a car scene and really all that moves on them is their heads and their mouths. And to carry it off as two actors and then have the vehicle move, that’s pretty terrific. And we just sort of do it and go, “Oh, such a pain. The focus is so tricky between those tiny heads. And, you know, making those treads move and whatever.” There’s lots of issues making it work technically. But the fact that these puppets are, what are they, John? Like six inches tall?

JOHN: Six inches. Yeah.

FRANK: And we’re doing two of them locked in a car. We’re going to car scene and it works great and then the car drives away. I will never tire of that. That’s the best of Thunderbirds and the best of every puppet show I’ve ever seen.

JOHN: Yeaaaah.

FRANK: Right there. I love that.

JOHN: I love that.

JOE: Fraggle Rock: the best of Thunderbirds.

JOHN: [laughs] That’s our spinoff series.

JOE: That’s the one.

FRANK: Oh I tell you. When I saw all the monorails and the Doozer tractors and stuff, you could have just, everybody leave. I just want to be here alone for about three weeks and play with this stuff. It was beautiful.

JOE: I mean, I have to assume that it’s been something that you guys have wanted to do and you probably would have done if you got twenty-some episodes per season, of doing an all-Doozer episode. I know the old Fraggle Rock had done at least one of those. And it would be a huge, huge challenge for you to make it visually exciting, visually interesting. But I mean I have all the faith in the world that you could pull it off and I would love to see it.

JOHN: Yeah, yeah especially with the technology. And it’s the same RC, essentially the same RC components that the 80s show was made with, just it’s better. The machinery’s better. But also just the evolution of the fact that they have a monorail now and the fact that they have little iPads and they can do holograms. It was important to make them always be like a step ahead.

JOE: Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, let’s see what else they could do. Let’s have them invent something. I don’t know. You’ll do a whole episode about it.

Anyway back at the great hall, Boober’s radish cakes are on display. They look delicious, as we said. Barry Blueberry and Sherry Contrary are there. They are introducing everyone to the Great Radish Ball. Barry Blueberry gets so much good stuff to do here. And having him up against a new character with Sherry Contrary adds so much more to him.

JOHN: Yeah.

JOE: Especially, my favorite thing is that utter disdain he sometimes seems to have.

JOHN: [laughs] Yeah.

JOE: (imitates Barry Blueberry) Thanks, Sher. (in normal voice) That sort of thing.

JOHN: Yep.

JOE: Hysterical. Every time.

JOHN: He was so much fun. So much fun. We decided that Barry and Sherry definitely are like, they’re frenemies that go on vacation together. They definitely respect each other professionally. And again, they go out because everyone expects them to together. But there’s definitely history there. [laughs] There’s some interesting history there.

JOE: Yeah. Yeah. And yeah, like you say, they’re probably going on vacation together. They’re choosing to be together, even though they’re driving each other bananas.

JOHN: Even though they’re rivals when it comes to their professional lives. By the way, something that I’ve also seen people comment on, I just want to say real quick about Sherry, is that they’re like, “Oh, her tail is white.” And there’s two reasons for that. That is a modified background puppet. The puppet itself is new, I should say. The puppet is new, but the design.

JOE: Yeah.

JOHN: And that background puppet had white hair, if you remember her from the first season. And what’s really fun is that we were like, “Oh, no, Sherry totally just dyes her top head hair. She doesn’t dye her tail.”

JOE: Yeah.

JOHN: And so that’s why it’s white. So we thought that was kind of a funny little thing.

JOE: Oh, I like that. Yeah. Especially because she has such a, I don’t have a picture of her in front of me, but she does have like a molded, very straight hair style.

JOHN: Sculpted. Yeah.

JOE: Sculpted. That’s what I’m going to say, sculpted. So that makes sense that, like, yes, she would dye her hair. She would make sure it’s in the perfect, like she’s going on TV or whatever the Fraggle equivalent to that is. So like, she’s going to look perfect. And part of that is, she can’t have white hair. That’s insane.

JOHN: It’s business in the front and Fraggle in the back.

JOE: [laughs] That’s right. Barry and Sherry also introduce Jamdolin and the Troubadours. They’re back. And we get our first song. It’s “Fun Is Here to Stay,” which is from the original series episode, “Sidebottom Blues.” I love this song. It’s so good.

JOHN: It’s one of the best.

JOE: It really is. And the fact that, spoilers, we’ll hear it over and over and over again. It is the kind of song you really do want to hear over and over and over again. And I mean, this is just another one of those big, like, there’s a lot going on on the screen. And everyone’s dancing, everyone’s singing. But there’s one thing that I wanted to point out, which is I’ve been trying really hard to look in the background and see what everyone’s doing, because I know that the puppeteers are just having fun back there.

And there’s one inkspot who’s handing out cake. And he goes up to a Fraggle, like a gray fraggle, offering him cake, the gray fraggle reaches out as if he’s taking it, but you know, fraggles don’t have real hands.

JOHN: Right.

JOE: So he doesn’t actually grab anything. And so because he doesn’t grab anything, the inkspot has this look of like, “Oh, he didn’t take it.” And he looks all disappointed and walks away.

JOHN: [laughs] That was probably Dan Garza because Dan Garza loves doing an inkspot and he loves busyness with inkspots. And I’m 90% sure that was probably Dan Garza back there doing that for sure.

JOE: I love it. It made me laugh.

JOHN: This is also, I have to give Frank, Frank Meschkuleit is such a genius, like I said earlier when it comes to props and bits. Frank, you get this movement with the tray that you do with Boober. I don’t know how you did that. You do this like, as if Boober is like doing this dance with the tray during this song. I can’t even describe what it is.

FRANK: It’s like that rolling coin on the tables.

JOHN and JOE: Yes!

JOHN: It is so good. And I watched that clip a million times. I’m still like, and I saw you do it live, and I’m like, that looks so good.

FRANK: Thanks, John. That was fun. You know, that was a mini-celebration because to get through that, I mean, we cut back and forth between Boober handing out cake in that song and the band playing, right? But in order to get the master, I had to run through an ocean of C stands, which are holding the stuff up.

And there’s like 25 puppeteers and these seven each get a slice of cake and the tray has to be at just such an angle so that that person can get their slice and it’s all on magnets and wires and if anything goes wrong, it falls apart. Which I managed to do numerous times. So I think part of the reason that that excited little tray move came out is because I got it. I finally got it because I’m moving backwards.

JOHN: I think you’re right.

FRANK: Then it’s forwards and then I got to look at the floor and then I gotta remember Karen’s C stand has the long leg there. Step over that, then there’s 17 cables for the monitors. And when it finally, and I gotta lip sync while I’m doing all this, right? When it finally happened, it was like, “Woophoo. This is great.” I do the little tray thing. And it turned out pretty cool.

JOHN: Yeah, and every piece of cake has a rod on it and it’s hanging off the tray so that the other puppeteer could grab that rod as if the puppet, the fraggle is taking it. So to Frank’s point, if he even just tilted that tray slightly, one of the pieces would fall off with the rod and the whole take would be busted. So I don’t know how you did it. You were a master in that. It was amazing.

FRANK: I recall that you were the choreographer, John. I didn’t want to disappoint you. And it did take a few tries, but it’s pretty cool. It’s almost the disappointment when you see the final show as one of the puppeteers and you go, “I worked so hard for that master. We got the whole thing and they’re only using four seconds.”

JOHN: We cut away.

FRANK: You know, they cut away back to. But yeah, that was a fun day for me. I actually really, I celebrated that day. That was a terrific day.

JOE: And it really does look so good, especially as you said, of the fraggles taking the cake. It looks so natural and I’m glad you guys just explained it because I couldn’t wrap my brain around exactly what was happening.

JOHN: Yeah. It was hard.

JOE: And yeah. It looks hard, but also so simple. They’re just on rods. Yeah. You guys make it look so good.

FRANK: That’s why everybody does it because it’s so easy.

JOE: Yeah, of course. And speaking of things looking so good, the ball was like a blast. Boober had such a good time, he said, “Wow,” three times. That’s big for Boober. And he says, “As long as there’s radishes, there will always be a Radish Ball.” And cue Icy Joe, who runs in in a panic because there are no radishes left. She looked high. She looked low. She looked to. And you better believe she looked fro.

And as we said at the top of this episode, Boober absolutely thinks that he’s being punished for having a good time. That is such classic Boober.

FRANK: Yep.

JOHN: Yup.

FRANK: How dare he live a good life.

JOE: Yeah, really. I mean, he should know better than to have a good time. It’s his own fault. It’s like when you leave the house with your umbrella, and it doesn’t rain or vice versa. You’re like, it’s my fault.

JOHN: And then the next time you leave without it, it rains. Always.

JOE: Yeah. Right, that’s what it is. You leave without the umbrella, you’re like, it’s my fault for not bringing my umbrella. That’s why it’s raining today. So Boober goes searching for radishes. He looks under a rock, which falls onto his toe, which kind of looked a little bit like an ad lib like it was supposed to go on the thing, but it fell and then you kind of did a, “oof.” Is that accurate, Frank?

FRANK: I recall that that was another one of those long masters. And I had a wiggie day that day. I was trying to…Dave did this beautiful thing somewhere in the original series where Boober would run into a corner and he’d lean into it the way, you know, the way a motorcycle would lean into a corner. And I started thinking about it way too much. And it just clouded what I was doing. And all I had to do was come in and I could probably remember the line too. Someone must have stashed some radishes somewhere.

So I’ve got a double “sh” in there and I’m trying to do the voice. And I gotta run around the corner and it’s like a three-part run. I think there was like a hole in the rock that I ran behind and then I came across the foreground and then again to where the stuff was. And I wanted to pick up that rock, Joe. And it was all planned. But there was something about the moss on the rock. I couldn’t let it go. And because it was a tight alley and I had to, Ingrid came in to help me out, but it kept sticking to my hand. And at one point I picked it up. And when I went to set it down, it fell. And I went “Ow, my toe.” And I took a few steps away.

And then I went, “Oh, I threw that take in the garbage because I dropped the rock on my toe. And now we’ve broken continuity with rock placement.” Right? So if you watch the final take, they used the bit where I dropped the rock on my toe. And then the rock mysteriously reappears.

JOE: Oh, I didn’t notice that.

JOHN: It was so good. I was there for that filming. And it was so good. Because it looks so real the way Frank made him react and say, “Ow, my toe.” And it just felt so right for Boober in that moment. Of course, you would drop a rock on his toe because he’s so frustrated. Like all of us do, right? When we drop things, we’re frustrated when we’re in a hurry. So I think that Paul [Fox], the director, was like, we have to keep that. It’s so good.

FRANK: Yeah, that’s a perfect example of effective editing because on the day, I remember thinking, “I gotta go faster. It feels too long. I gotta go faster.” And it was so much ground to cover that going faster literally became an impediment to me doing anything else right.

JOHN: Another Boober lesson.

FRANK: Another Boober lesson, exactly. Yeah, I love the way that looked.

JOE: Yeah, no, it looked fantastic. And I did not, I was so entertained by it, I didn’t notice that the rock magically reappeared. Which again, it’s Fraggle Rock, there’s magic here. You know, that’s okay.

FRANK: Lots happening. [laughs]

JOE: So unfortunately, Johnny, I know that you have to run. There’s a Fraggle hole right next to you that you’ve got to jump in. It’s going to teleport you somewhere else.

[John laughs]

JOE: But if we were able to do this all over again, I’m sure we would have loved to have had you for the entire episode.

JOHN: Yes. I’m sorry. I have to go make more Fraggle magic. There’s wonderful, Fraggley things happening, so I have to go. But I couldn’t think of a better way to spend this time with you guys. And it makes me happy to be with both of you.

JOE: Oh, thank you so much. And we’ll definitely have you back here on the podcast. This is not the end for us, Johnny.

JOHN: That’s right. That’s right. There’s more.

JOE: Yes.

JOHN: There’s much more.

JOE: There’s always more. Thank you for heading off to make more Fraggle magic for us.

JOHN: All right. I’ll see you guys soon.

JOE: Bye.

JOHN: Bye. Love you, Frank!

FRANK: Back at you, my friend.

JOE: So Frank, you’re sticking around. Thank you for being here.

FRANK: Yeah, if you want. If you want, Joe.

JOE: I do!

FRANK: Yeah, I’m the poor man’s John Tartaglia now. Okay. I’ll do my best.

JOE: I don’t think anyone wants to listen to me talk to myself. So I’m glad that [laughs] there’s someone here to shut me up once in a while.

Okay. Let’s get back into this episode. So you’ve looked under the rock. It’s not there. You’re checking, er, Boober’s checking under a sheet of moss and discovers a glowing hole. As we established, Red and Wembley saw a similar hole in “Twisty-Turny-Thon.”

And so, okay. So there’s like light coming up, but it’s kind of flickering and there’s like dust that’s passing through the light. Do you recall exactly what this effect was that made it look that way?

FRANK: Was literally a lot of light and then some atmosphere, some smoke.

JOE: That was it, huh?

FRANK: Yeah, I don’t think there’s any post on that. You can’t quote me on that because I’m not there for the post process, but it’s a classic film moment. You know, where you have a darker set and then through this window or through this tunnel, there’s this shaft of light. And when you add some atmosphere, which is just literally a smoke machine that creates a dense sort of foggy smoke, it shows where the light is and where the light ain’t. And where the light is just becomes this like channel of light. It’s quite effective. It’s quite a nice piece of magic.

JOE: Yeah, looks real cool. And it definitely makes it seem special as compared to like all of the other types of caves and holes that we see all through Fraggle Rock. Definitely the kind of thing that you would want to jump into without knowing where it leads. [laughs]

FRANK: Well, you knew that Boober was desperate for a radish when he was willing to be the first man down, right?

JOE: Yeah, really. The first guy in. Yeah. Yeah. No joke.

FRANK: It’s kind of a counterpoint to his character that he would not be totally afraid of this, but he was more afraid, I think, of life without radish. So he’s like, “It might be here. Let’s go.” And he went.

JOE: That’s right. Yeah. That is one thing about Boober and danger is like he may be afraid of it or he may, you know, shy away from it as much as possible, but he can deal with it if it comes across. He knows that whatever’s on the other side of this tunnel, like, yeah, it’s not going to be good, but he’s used to things not being good.

FRANK: Yeah, I think Boober’s got his own coping mechanisms, right? He knows that he’s anxious and he knows that there’s trouble around every corner. And yet, who’s the guy who goes around the corner? It’s almost always Boober because he’s like–

JOE: That’s right.

FRANK: Someone’s gotta do it. He has to. He’s compelled to just get it over with so that he can go back to ironing around the buttonhole and stuff. All the good stuff.

JOE: That’s right. [laughs] So yeah, so Boober jumps in and all the other Fraggles jump in right after him. And we get this great shot of them falling through this glowing wormhole. Did you see the TV show Sliders from the 90s?

FRANK: No, I’m too old for that one. But I was trying to think this morning, what does this evocative of? Because it’s a great effect.

JOE: Yeah.

FRANK: That sliding and the little tunnel curving and them all doing their waving.

JOE: Yeah. There was a TV show, I don’t know if this is deliberate, but there was a TV show in the late 90s called Sliders, with Jerry O’Connell. And it was, you know, basically they would jump through these portals and they would go to alternate earths, this multiverse thing that now is in every movie, every franchise. But the effect of them traveling was very similar to this. We didn’t see them floating on the green screen like we see the Fraggles here, but it’s the same kind of long tunnel that kind of curves with the effects. It definitely feels, this is very Sliders-y.

FRANK: So they could’ve popped out of that Fraggle hole.

JOE: That’s true. It would have been nice to see them cross paths maybe.

FRANK: [laughs] Yeah. Sure.

JOE: Like, that guy looks familiar. I think he was on TV. [laughs] The Fraggles all pop out of the hole. And I love this shot. So we talked to a few minutes ago about Sprocket being balled up and kind of thrown. And it seems like it’s a similar effect with the Fraggles being tossed, but the rate in which all five of them pop out of that hole, it’s like pop pop pop pop pop pop.

FRANK: Yeah.

JOE: Is it actually happening that fast on the day?

FRANK: I’m going to say, yeah, because the way they fall, Joe, looks, the scale of it looks right to me. You know, they don’t fall quickly. They fall appropriate to their weight. And as I recall, we were already in our final position with our puppets. And there were five throwers who just went one, two, three, four, five! [Makes breathy “pew” noise] Speaking of which, I love that little… that they do on that sound is beautiful when they pop out. 

JOE: Yeah. 

FRANK: I just thought that was the perfect. And a bit of glass sound to it. You know, I just thought it was gorgeous.

JOE: Yeah, yeah. It’s exactly what you would expect from a Fraggle popping out of a hole. And to like make it feel fun, like it’s not scary. It’s not dangerous. No one’s getting hurt. You know, they’re saying, “Whee!”

FRANK: Yeah, exactly. I think that’s important. Yeah, so I thought that was very effective them popping in and out of that hole was, you know, one of the favorite moments for me of the episode.

JOE: Yeah, yeah, it looks great. And of course we’ll get to see it a whole bunch more times because they have now traveled back in time. It’s the beginning of the night of The Great Radish Ball. They could hear the music playing. They could hear Barry Blueberry and Sherry Contrary doing their intro. And Boober is so excited because not only, it’s like a double whammy for him. Not only does this great night never have to end. He could just have fun. But they don’t have to face tomorrow. There’s no radishes tomorrow. We don’t have to deal with that at all.

And this is the beginning of this great montage where they’re just doing the whole thing all over again, and again and again and every time they come across something that they want to redo, they just shout, “Tube!” And they all go back to the tube and they start the night over.

So Gobo restarts so that he can have his guitar so he can jam with the Troubadours. Boober restarts the day so that he can make sure that everyone gets cake. Wembley restarts because he’s doing this “think of a number, any number” trick with one of the other Fraggles. Mokey restarts to save an inkspot from getting hit by that Fraggle. And Red restarts to nail this spinning dance move that she keeps falling at the end of.

And this is the one that I have a question about. So Red is basically just spinning as if she’s on the end of a drill. What is–

FRANK: She almost literally is.

JOE: Yeah.

FRANK: The great guys in the shop built, as I recall Joe, it’s a wearable rig that Karen puts on with like a breastplate and a motor on it and the motor had a vertical shaft that went to a pre-rigged Red in the pirouette position. So that meant that Karen could walk straight while Red was spinning at about 90 RPM. It was a pretty aggressive spin. And I remember that they had to change the position of Red because it’s like an uneven load in your dryer, right? If you’ve got all the bathrobe on one side, the thing’s going to go, “goh womp, goh womp, goh womp.”

And then Red was doing this more of a vortex as opposed to a nice spiral. So she wore that a couple of times and used it to great effect.

JOE: Oh, that’s fun. I like that.

FRANK: Yeah. It was a cool trick.

JOE: And also we don’t have to tell Karen Prell. Okay, so we need you to spin. And not get sick.

FRANK: Yeah, at sixty miles an hour.

JOE: [laughs] Yeah, right.

FRANK: We need to do 15 takes. I think she tried it. I think she was pretty game. And at one point, I think there was a rotating dolly that Karen could sit on and a couple of grips were spinning it. But as soon as you go a little bit off center, you just go shooting off that thing like a carnival ride.

JOE: No, I’m sure. Yeah.

FRANK: So I think this solution was appropriate and safe and extremely effective. Looked brilliant.

JOE: Great. And I’m sure it’s impossible to watch a monitor when you’re spinning. I mean, just to know that you’re in the frame.

FRANK: Yeah, but Karen walking through frame with, she was just facing one direction.

JOE: Yeah.

FRANK: It was no big deal. And then there was either the cutaway to or a second Red waiting in the wing so that when she spun through and we came back and she was in somebody’s arms with the eyes slightly crossed, which was a nice effect.

JOE: Yeah. [laughs]

FRANK: Do that as a one-er. Just make sure that the spinny guy gets out of frame.

JOE: Yep.

FRANK: Of the sequences that they all employed the tube for, I think that was my favorite.

JOE: Yeah, that’s pretty fun. Yeah. So Boober wants to keep repeating the day, but everyone is just exhausted. They want to end the day. Let tomorrow happen. It’s fine. And I like that Boober is just going like one more tube? Half more tube? Which I don’t know what a half more tube would be, but I love that Boober’s trying. And they say, “No, no, we have to end this thing. We’re going to seal up the tube with a giant boulder.”

And so as the Fraggles go and get this big boulder, and they put it on the tube, they don’t notice Boober’s already gone through by himself. And he pops out of the tube. He turns round and the hole is missing. And we now have like two separate timelines. The logic of the time travel here is out the window. Trying so hard as a sci-fi fan not to think too hard about it. Because it’s like are there two different universes now? Or is Boober going to catch up to the other? Like none of it makes any sense. That’s fine. Don’t think about it. It’s just fun.

FRANK: Fraggle Rock. That’s how it works.

JOE: It’s Fraggle Rock. That’s right. Yes. It’s a magic hole. Deal with it. This is where we get our second song of the episode. It’s called “Over and Over.” And this is Boober singing while he’s in the Radish Ball day. And we see that he is now being forced to live this day over and over and over again. And it’s a great effect because Boober is clear in the frame, but everything else behind him.

FRANK: Yeah. Great effect.

JOE: All the other Fraggles have this like blurry look to them.

FRANK: Yeah, there’s a surreal element to it for sure.

JOE: Yeah, yeah. And definitely like we’re getting some good like Boober freak out moments here.

FRANK: Ooh.

JOE: And you know, talking about you trying to kind of mimic some of those Dave Goelz-isms of his puppetry style. There’s something that he does. I don’t know if I’ll be able to explain this well. But when in this song when Boober kind of freaks out to the camera, there’s something that he does where he kind of like sticks his lower jaw out a little bit at kind of a little bit of an angle. And it’s something that I swear I’ve seen Dave do a thousand times with all of his characters. And it just feels like you really just channeled him so well in those moments.

FRANK: You know what, Joe, what’s interesting about that is I think we were, at that point we were block shooting. We had three studios going. And it was a gorg day. So that’s actually Johnny. Most of that clip is Johnny.

JOE: Oh.

JOHNNY: It’s too bad he’s gone. But give him his kudos here though. And he did a terrific job with that. And Dave really cranked that song too, man. It was not a low energy song. And Johnny was terrific. He was all over it. I mean, I think I did a part of it. But honestly, the lion’s share on that song was John.

JOE: Wow. Well, good for you for giving him credit. You could have taken all the credit. And nobody would have ever questioned it.

FRANK: That wouldn’t be fair. And this is the beauty of puppets is that you can say, “You know what? In this scene I’ve got to be in three places at once. Can you do this character?” And when you have someone as versatile and as steeped in the lore of Fraggle as Johnny, I think he could step into just about any character and at least give it a good throw if not do it better than me, which makes me sad right now. [laughs]

JOE: Oh no, no. But if you’re going to have anyone step in for you, like what a joy that it’s John Tartaglia. You know, it’s not some schmo off the street and you’re like, “You’re making me look bad kid.”

FRANK: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. No, but John, he really hit that one out of the park. It’s a terrific song. Looks great.

JOE: Yeah.

FRANK: Everyone was pleased with that, for sure.

JOE: Yeah, super fun song. Yeah, I very much enjoyed it. And also like it just feels like you’re inside of Boober’s head and like part of that panic. And that’s so delightfully Boober and really truly like building that tension for this episode in a really delightful way.

FRANK: You know, interestingly, Joe, just to comment on that. The fact that Boober was quite content to have lived that night over and over earlier in the episode when he was with his friends, but without his friends, it’s a horror for him. An absolute horror. And he can’t wait to get out and he just doesn’t know how.

JOE: Yeah.

FRANK: I would like to think he had every opportunity to enjoy the evening alone the way he did earlier when they were all exploring the joys of the tube. But it wore on him very quickly because he was so isolated, which curiously is the thing he’s looking for so often, but when he finally has it, it’s like “This isn’t what I wanted at all. I want to be with my friends.”

JOE: Yeah, yeah. In your imagination and in your own headcanon, how many times or rather how long do you think Boober was stuck in these time loops?

FRANK: During that last song or for the whole episode you mean?

JOE: For the whole episode. Do you think it was just like, oh, it’s like an hour or two of his time? Or do you think he was like, was he in there for years?

FRANK: [laughs] That’s an interesting thought. I think that all the Fraggles are pretty high energy. So if you’ve tired out Red and Mokey and Gobo, you know, you’ve done something. So I’m going to say 60. They went through sixty times.

JOE: Yeah.

FRANK: And the only one who’s game from more is Boober again because it’s like heaven. I can be here and know what’s going to happen and none of it’s bad and I win. I win.

JOE: Amazing.

FRANK: Over and over and over again.

JOE: Love to see Boober get a win once in a while even if it turns into not such a win by the end.

FRANK: Totally.

JOE: Nice to see him happy for a little bit.

FRANK: Yeah, it’s nice to see.

JOE: Boober finds Cotterpin who’s using hydroponics to grow radishes and this is something that I also love about the growth of Boober in season two is we’ve seen him really show interest in different types of science. Like he’s got hobbies beyond laundry and cooking. He’s also interested in, here it’s hydroponics, in another episode it’s meteorology and another one it’s seismology and like, I love this tiny little detail that you guys have added to his character.

FRANK: Yeah, I think that’s pretty cool where he becomes, you can imagine him becoming sort of a MacGyver when they’re really stuck somewhere that he’s got some piece of information. He goes, “I know how to make a cannon.”

JOE: [laughs] Yeah!

FRANK: He’s the professor from Gilligan’s Island, you know.

JOE: Right. Give him a couple of coconuts. He’ll get you out of this.

FRANK: Yeah, exactly. I’ll make your radio. So it’s pretty cool that he just offhandedly goes, “Yeah, I know about fog and I know about this and I know about botany.” So yeah, it’s a pretty neat element. It’d be interesting to see if there’s more that we can juice out of that later on.

JOE: Yeah, I hope so for sure. So Cotterpin has figured out how to grow radishes without needing soil. Because the soil’s all filled with gorgamax up above. Cotterpin’s optimism for the future of these radish sprouts has inspired Boober to want to see tomorrow again. That’s his hope for the future. You can’t have radishes unless you make it to tomorrow. Meanwhile, while he’s having this revelation, the Fraggles, the rest of the Fraggles are trying to pry the boulder off of the tube. It’s apparently not too heavy for them to lift but too heavy for them to lift a second time. Or maybe there’s like a suction thing happening.

FRANK: I think it got wedged, Joe. That’s my theory.

JOE: Okay. Yeah, wedged. I’ll take that. They need a Fraggle with super Fraggle strength and an old-timey, strong build to help. And of course, it’s Icy Joe.

FRANK: What a unique descriptor for someone. Who do we know with (laughing) an old-timey build?

JOE: [laughs] We need a taller than average Fraggle with baby blue colored skin.

FRANK: (in normal voice) And squinty eyes.

JOE: Who wears like a potato sack. Oh, it’s Icy Joe. I should have known. Icy Joe shows up and she helps them lift this big boulder and as they lift it, in Boober’s timeline, the tube magically reappears. And I love this shot, too, where Gobo’s little hand kind of pops up through the hole and we see inside the wormhole, all the Fraggles are doing we call it a Muppet ladder where they’re all kind of holding on to each other’s ankles and they’re up through the tunnel here.

And they pull Boober back through and they all pop out of the hole one more time. But this time they’re all attached to each other, which is another great visual. I mean, I assume, is there anything different to how you throw a fraggle when there’s like five of them attached?

FRANK: I think the wranglers went into hyperdrive to get all of the puppets wrangled in a believable position and then attach them firmly enough so that, because I think they were pulled out of the hole as opposed to thrown. So there was monofill, spider wire or something attached to the lead puppet. I don’t know if it was Wembley. I can’t remember right now.

And they probably had it on a long stick and then, three, two, one go and they just yanked on that stick and they just went [makes whistling sound] and flew out in a chain.

JOE: Great.

FRANK: That’s a tough thing to do without destroying the puppets. So like the wrangling department on set was top notch.

JOE: It seems like fraggle fishing. Like you have it on the end of a fishing rod and you just yank it.

FRANK: (in voice of Pa Gorg) Caught me a big one, Ma.

JOE: [laughs] Right. Boober has learned his lesson that tomorrow is where hope lives, which is a great line and that’s a great moral to this story. They’re all exhausted. So they all decide to go to bed. They’re going to have a slumber party and sleep in Gobo and Wembley’s cave. And in the morning, they’re woken up by that same fanfare and that same announcement by Barry Blueberry and Sherry Contrary. It’s like they’re back in the time loop, but they’re not here to welcome you to the Great Radish Ball. They’re here to welcome you to the Great Radish Ball… cleanup party.

FRANK: Yeah.

JOE: With a healthy pause just before cleanup party And I love this visual too because Barry and Sherry are wearing these cute little robes and they’ve got little coffee mugs with their own faces on them. It’s great.

FRANK: Yeah. Yeah. You know, there’s a neat moment in there, Joe, that I just have to acknowledge.

JOE: Yeah. Please.

FRANK: Because it’s natural when you’re on set with people for a long time that you gravitate towards. You love everybody, but you just there’s some that are just become so special to you, you can’t imagine your life after the show without them. And for me, it’d be Donna Kimball. I adore Donna and I like to think she thinks I’m all right too.

[Joe laughs]

FRANK: There’s a neat little scene, where they’re all looking through the cave hole at Sherry and Barry. And when they finally say Great Radish Ball cleanup party, Mokey’s head leans on to Boober. And I didn’t notice it when we were shooting, but I noticed it when I watched it back and I was like, “Oh, I love that. I love that.” And it isn’t a thing, you know, it’s not like a plot point that they have a relationship. But I love that they have a comfort between each other, which slid off of our friendship, Donna and my friendship. And there’s a few moments where Boober just kind of leans into Mokey or Mokey will touch Boober.

I love puppets touching each other. I think that it tells entire stories, you know. So when there’s a moment where Boober, who’s pretty reticent about touch, when he does it, it means something And when someone touches Boober and he doesn’t react to it, you know, it’s something. It’s very nuanced. It’s very small. It’s probably just for me. But there it is. I thought it was lovely. Thanks, Donna. [laughs]

JOE: Oh, yeah, that’s a really great observation. And you know, on the old Fraggle Rock this happened more often than on Back to the Rock, but I think because Mokey being who she is and being a very a little bit more of the spiritual character. And being the live hand puppet, as opposed to a rod hand puppet, I feel like she was always touching the other Fraggles. Always grabbing them, holding them close. There’s a lot of shots of her kind of off in her own world, but she’s grabbed Boober or Wembley or Gobo or someone and just like holding them close. Almost like they’re a stuffed animal.

FRANK: Mothering. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

JOE: Yeah. And so that feels very much in Mokey’s character. But do you think that she was kind of showing that affection to Boober because she’s like, “Oh, isn’t it nice that we’ve made it through this adventure, and we’re made it to tomorrow?” Or do you think she’s like, “Isn’t it great you get to clean? Your favorite thing. You love cleaning.” [laughs]

FRANK: I kind of think she senses the harmony coming back to the rock. And that the nearest person to her happens to be Boober at that moment. I mean, I know that Boober, pardon me, Red and Mokey have their own dynamic too, as roommates. But I think I noticed it because it was a parallel to what was happening on set between shoot days and stuff, where I was like, “Hey, there’s Donna. I just want to be near Donna. I like being near Donna.” I like being near everybody. But if everybody’s in a row, I’ll go see Donna first.

So it was just a nice little beat for me. It probably means nothing, Joe, but I’m going to read lots into it. How about that?

JOE: Yes, please do. That’s what this podcast is all about. We’re just reading far too much out of every little detail. Frank, do you have any other memories from this episode or other episodes that you wanted to share that maybe we didn’t get to while talking about it in detail?

FRANK: You know, I think that when they were using the tube, everyone got to do the thing they wanted to do, until they were tired of doing it. And Boober would have never tired of it with his gang. If he could, because not only, see, here’s the thing. Not only could Boober control what was happening to him when he had the tube at his power, but he could make sure his friends were okay too, because they were all there. And when Gobo forgot his guitar, it’s like, “tube time baby. Let’s go.” And they come back and they just fixed stuff with the tube.

And ostensibly Boober had discovered it. So it was like in his own way, he was a leader without having to be a leader. And he was a bold frontman without having to be a bold frontman because everyone was into it. And it just gave Boober a chance to like land in the comfy chair. And enjoy it knowing that he could get up and fix something and get right back in that chair again. Everyone else got tired of it physically. So, you know, I thought that was a nice exploration of Boober and I love that he came to rely on his friends more than his comfort. I think that’s a neat Boober point.

JOE: Yeah. I completely agree with all that. That’s really well said. So, Frank.

FRANK: Yeah.

JOE: There’s a question that we ask everybody at the end of these these Fraggle Talk podcasts, I would love to know how do you plan to make the world a little Fragglier?

FRANK: A little Fragglier. How do I plan to make the world a little Fragglier? I might do a top bun. What do you think?

JOE: Oh yeah. Yeah, I like it. Yeah, kind of pulling a little bit out of Wembley’s book of let’s just try a different hairstyle.

FRANK: Random looks. Yeah. Joe, to answer your question seriously. I’m a father. I don’t know if I can mention this, but I’m going to, you can cut it out, Joe, you’re smart. My wife and I have one child, no spares, and she just won a silver medal at the Paris Olympics.

JOE: Incredible.

FRANK: Yeah, it’s outstanding. So the process of becoming a father and watching this tiny helpless person become this powerful wolverine and going to a…It’s not just an international event. It’s the best athletes on the planet Earth and she walked away with a silver medal in her sport. It’s astounding and it gives me hope for the future. Because I find as I get older, I get a little more pessimistic because there’s just too much news and it’s coming at me too fast.

So when I watch a show like Fraggle Rock, of course you can look at it a million ways and pick it apart and say what you want, but it’s a hopeful show. It’s a show about hope. It’s a show about the future, and it’s a show about effort. It’s a show about examining where you are critically and saying something’s really wrong here. I got to fix it. I can’t live like this. I can’t be in this paradise where everything is everywhere I want, but I’m without my friends. It’s no good to me.

So, I would say that the journey the characters take on Fraggle Rock is similar in a way to the journey that a parent takes with their child. You invest and you hope and you optimize and you pray and with a little luck, the world is a better place because you put something good into it. And that I think is the Fraggle ethos and the ethos of the whole cast and crew of Back to the Rock.

JOE: Wow, beautifully said. Thank you so much for sharing that and congratulations to your daughter. What a gift. What a cool thing that she got to do and to come home with the medal.

FRANK: It’s extremely cool.

JOE: Incredible.

FRANK: Thank you. Thank you very much.

JOE: Absolutely.

FRANK: Always a pleasure to talk with you.

JOE: Such a pleasure to talk to you. Thank you so much for being here. Thank you for everything that you brought to Back to the Rock. Thanks to John Tartaglia who unfortunately had to leave early, but great to have him here as well.

And Frank, we’re hoping that we’re going to do this again for season three. Let’s renew just so we can have another podcast.

FRANK: I’d love nothing more, Joe. Thanks for your time today.

[Fraggle Talk theme music plays]

JOE: Fraggle Talk: the unofficial Fraggle Rock podcast is brought to you by ToughPigs.com. Produced, written and hosted by Joe Hennes. Fraggle Talk art by Dave Hulteen Jr. Fraggle Rock mark and logo, characters and elements are trademarks of the Jim Henson Company. All rights reserved. Transcripts provided by Katilyn Miller.

Fraggle Rock theme song, written by Philip Balsam and Dennis Lee, is used with permission. Special thanks to The Jim Henson company, Apple TV+ and the entire Fraggle Rock: Back to the Rock family.

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For more Fraggle podcast fun, listen to Fraggle Talk: Classic on your favorite podcast app. Thanks for listening and we’ll see you next time, down at Fraggle Talk.

[Music ends]