In case you haven’t heard amongst all of the noise of the upcoming Summer blockbuster season, there is a new muppets movie due out on November 23 of this year! I know Proletariatron and I have been catching the bits and pieces of the news as it has been released, but today Disney released the first teaser poster for the muppets’ triumphant return to the big screen in their latest film simply titled, The Muppets.
Jason Segell – who apparently is a hugemuppets fan – co-wrote the script and is starring in the film as Gary, the human that befriends the muppets and helps them save their beloved muppet theater from an oil tycoon bent on demolishing it to get to oil that he believes lies underneath it.
In an article in USA Today, Segel talked a bit about the film:
While the lifelong Muppet fan has vowed to keep the movie true to its original core, expect changes such as Kermit the Frog walking on-screen when the movie opens Nov. 23.
“Technology has changed,” says Segel. “We’re able to show them doing stuff they hadn’t been able to do before. We’re pretty proud of that.”
. . .
“We have every Muppet you could possibly think of,” he says, including Beaker and the Swedish Chef.
The filmmakers decided to embrace the fact that the Muppets have not been on-screen since 1999’s Muppets From Space.
“Entertainment changed. It became about animation, violence and cynicism. The Muppets sort of lost their place,” says Segel. “In the movie, we acknowledge that the Muppets had some rough years and went their own separate ways to start their own careers.”
Fozzie now performs with a Reno casino tribute band called the Moopets, Miss Piggy is a plus-size fashion editor at Vogue Paris, and Animal is in a Santa Barbara clinic for anger management.
There have been some concerns amongst muppet fans regarding Segel’s comment about “technology changing” that he may mean the use of CGI muppets. My guess is that this is not the case as everything Segel has said about this film is that it is going to be a classic muppet movie. My own speculation is that the only CGI we will be seeing (if any) in this film involving muppets may be the removal of rods and other mpuppetry tools to accomplish full-body shots, etc.
Having just watched The Muppets Take Manhattan on Netflix a few weeks ago – which, by the way, still holds up today and is a great film – I couldn’t be more excited for the return of Kermit and Miss Piggy and company this November and will be planted firmly in a seat at my local theater opening weekend. Of course, it wouldn’t be a muppet movie without a bevy of human-star cameos. Here’s a list of some stars you can expect so far:
- Amy Adams
- Chris Cooper
- Emily Blunt
- John Krasinsky
- Sean Penn
- Neil Patrick Harris
- Jack Black
- Danny Trejo
- Zack Galifianakis
- Katy Perry
- Ed Helms
- Ricky Gervais
- Whoopy Goldberg
- Mickey Rooney
and the list goes on . . .
The Muppets opens on November 23, 2011.
