Fraggle Rock reboot shoot is ready to roll
After months of building elaborate sets and puppets, cameras are finally ready to roll on a Fraggle Rock reboot in Calgary.
While specific details about plot and characters are being kept tightly under wraps, filming is set to begin on Monday for the new series, a co-production between The Jim Henson Company, Appletv+ and New Regency Productions. It will bring back the cave-dwelling characters created by Jim Henson for the popular program that ran for five seasons in the 1980s and spawned several spinoffs.
The new series has been in pre-production since at least early November under the name Raphanus, which is Latin for radish.
“One of the challenges of being in the studio is that you have to make everything,” says producer Ritamarie Peruggi. “So there is a lot of prep in terms of what the set is going to look like ... bringing all the people together to build the set and timing that all to make sure the set build hits the lighting people and they get a chance to light and then going in and walking through the sets and taking a look at everything.”
Meanwhile, a “satellite creature shop” has been set up to build the puppets.
In the spring, The Jim Henson Company and Appletv+ teamed up for Fraggle Rock: Rock On, a series of digital shorts that were filmed at performers' homes on iphones.
The new series will be separate from that show, although some of the same talent is involved, Peruggi says.
The Calgary-based crew has also had a bit of a learning curve since many had never worked with puppets before.
“I find you bring in some good people that are open to figuring out how to make things work,” Peruggi says. “We've been very fortunate because we've been able to use the infrastructure that exists here and blend what we need into what our needs are for the production.”
A streaming date for the new series has not yet been set.