Can you tell me how to get a joke on Sesame Street?
A raunchy new Muppet-inspired movie has been revealed
Here are a few things that happen in the trailer for The Happytime Murders:
A puppet in a bondage collar offers to perform oral sex on Melissa McCarthy for 50 cents. A severed puppet hand is placed in an evidence bag. Two puppets, an octopus and llama, are gunned down at point-blank range. Then there is the money shot in which a puppet is shown ejaculating at the end of a deranged sex scene. As you can imagine, The Happytime Murders, in theatres on August 17, is brought to you by the letter R.
Accurately described by producers as “a filthy comedy,” this is not for kids, or even adults who may get squeamish when puppets and humans behave badly in strip clubs and during treacherous poker games.
But it is the film’s tagline — “No Sesame. All Street” — that is causing controversy.
Sesame Workshop, which produces Sesame Street, is suing STX Entertainment, claiming the tagline may cause viewers to wrongly associate The Happytime Murders with its beloved children’s show. As the non-profit group argues, the trailer portrays “explicit, profane, drug-using, misogynistic, violent, copulating, and even ejaculating puppets” that, when placed in context of the tagline, have “diluted and defiled” a wholesome brand.
In other words, this filthy comedy might make some viewers think Sesame Workshop was involved with the film, which it was not. It might lead some to believe Sesame Street has dark alleys where Big Bird turns tricks, the Cookie Monster is a murderous thug and Grover is strung out on purple ecstasy.
But if STX is worried about the lawsuit, it is doing a great job of bluffing.
The company responded with a statement from Fred Esq., a puppet lawyer.
“STX loved the idea of working closely with (director) Brian Henson and the Jim Henson Company to tell the untold story of the active lives of Henson puppets when they’re not performing in front of children,” said Mr. Esq. “Happytime Murders is the happy result of that collaboration and we’re incredibly pleased with the early reaction to the film and how well the trailer has been received by its intended audience. While we’re disappointed that Sesame Street does not share in the fun, we are confident in our legal position.”
The United States District Court for the Southern District of New York must now sort out this puppet imbroglio. Personally, I thought the tagline was clever. Nothing in the trailer that evokes “Sunny Days.” I don’t understand how anyone might confuse The Happytime Murders with Sesame Street, which is like mixing up Ted with Elmo or Chucky with Ernie.
This is hardly the first time movie puppets were cast as sociopaths.
But there is a larger cultural point, one Sesame Workshop should keep in mind: for years, the show has taken creative liberties with other brands under the banner of parody. From the Hunger Games to the Avengers, from True Blood to Mad Men, other sendups on 123 Sesame Street now include: A’s Anatomy, Birdwalk Empire, Homelamb, Twin Beaks, Orange Is The New Snack, and even a spoof of an Old Spice commercial starring Grover, “Smell Like a Monster.”
The show has satirized CNN as GNN, the Grouchy News Network. It has ridiculed Fox News as Pox News. Long before Donald Trump stormed the White House, Sesame Street savaged him as “Ronald Grump,” a shady tycoon with no scruples.
“Rotten to meet you,” Grump says to Oscar, in one of three appearances the character made on the show. “Grump’s the name — Ronald Grump. And I’m a Grouch builder. I make places for Grouches to live.” Incredibly, the real Trump did not sue. Sesame Street turns 50 next year, a momentous achievement. I can’t imagine my own childhood without it. But while educating children over a halfcentury, it has also absorbed some hard lessons and survived controversies bigger than a tagline.
There was that time in 2011 when the show’s YouTube channel was hacked and replaced with porn. There was the outfit Katy Perry wore in a duet with Elmo that was deemed so risqué, the music video was spiked from conventional airwaves.
Shortly after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, anti-American protestors in Bangladesh marched with posters of Osama bin Laden and — wait for it — Bert. Yes, an Internet joke led some to believe Bert had joined the Taliban.
A decade earlier, Sesame Workshop threatened another lawsuit: this time over a satirical short that depicted Bert and Ernie as lovers. Then there was the incident in 2012, in which Kevin Clash, the voice of Elmo, resigned amid a sex scandal and allegations he had inappropriate relationships with teenage males.
If none of this defiled the brand, it’s doubtful a tagline in filthy comedy will cause any damage to a show that now runs on HBO, home to content that is not always family-friendly. If anything, Sesame Street has just helped The Happytime Murders by giving it a heap of free publicity bigger than Mr. Snuffleupagus.
Who’s the puppet now?