Watch with Father: Julie's Greenroom

Sometimes, a series comes along that is pretty much just what you want your child to be watching, and then sometimes a series comes along that is what you never knew you needed your child to be watching. If you'd asked me what I wanted Arya to be watching a month ago, I probably wouldn't have shot for a diverse group of Muppet children and a duck attending an all-star series of performing arts workshops led by Julie Andrews(1), and yet here comes Julie's Greenroom, and it is glorious.

Ms Julie and her stage manager, Gus, run a performing arts centre with a prestigious youth 'Greenroom' workshop. When a burst pipe destroys the prop collection, the latest workshop group set out to create their own original musical using what they learn in a series of masterclasses given by the Greenroom's alumni. The latter group includes Idina Menzel, Glee! alumnus and author Chris Colfer, baritone Josh Groban(2), Alec Baldwin, ballet dancers Robert Fairchild and Tyler Peck(3), Sara Bareilles, Ellie Kemper and Tituss Burgess, violinist Joshua Bell, and David Hyde Pierce. There are also appearances from Stomp, Cirque de Soleil and a visit to the set of Wicked.

The 'Greenies' are performed by veteran Henson puppeteers, including Stephanie D'Abruzzo, John Tartaglia and Jennifer Barnhart, three of the four Sesame Street performers who originated the puppet roles in Avenue Q(4). The characters are diverse in many ways, including: Hank, a paraplegic pianist and sports fan; Peri, a theatre buff and drama queen from a rich family; Fizz, a young Hispanic girl; Spike, an African-American linguaphile; and technophile Riley. Riley is most interesting for what she isn't quite. She is identified, when unavoidable, as female, but lacks any distinctive gender coding. With production crew suggesting that Riley is likely to self-identify as non-binary at some point, I'm not sure why they didn't just go for it.

There's also Hugo. He's a duck.

Through their workshops, the Greenies learn about various aspects of the performing arts, including technical skills like costume design and harmony singing, as well as more personal lessons, such as the importance of practice, or that ballet isn't just for girls and waterfowl. In episode 2, when Spike feels unequal to the task of being a writer because he's never seen a writer who looks like him, everyone sings a song about the importance of diverse voices. Peri learns that being cast as the ogre instead of the princess isn't a slight, and Fizz learns the importance of practice. Hank learns to dance, and Riley learns that the technical and creative are not mutually exclusive.

You know what it is? It's like if Julie Andrews took over the Muppet theatre and ran a class for Sesame Street characters, and exactly as awesome as that sounds. The only problem is that there are only thirteen half-hour episodes and no sign of a season 2, alas.

(1) Who is also credited as creator of the show. I also imagine it didn't hurt when it came to attracting guest stars. "You've had an offer to do a show with Julie Andrews and Muppets," probably isn't a tough sell.

(2) I may have to forgive him for his butchering of 'Evermore' in the end credits of Beauty and the Beast.

(3) They make a lot of their 'fairytale marriage', so I imagine a lot of parents may end up having tricky conversations about how they separated a few months after the show came out.

(4) A poster for which appears in the greenroom itself.

Furchester Hotel

Welcome!

"We welcome you with furry arms!"

Welcome to the Furchester Hotel, the finest half-star establishment anywhere. Run by Furnella Furchester and her husband Fergus Fuzz, and staffed by their daughter Phoebe, Furnella's nephew Elmo and an itinerant American catering worker with breathtaking impulse control issues, the Furchester is kind of like the Happiness Hotel from The Great Muppet Caper after a serious cash injection. A tottering pile of eccentric rooms with an easily distracted staff, it nonetheless manages to retain several long-term guests and attract new visitors every episode.

"Cookie monster! Mr Crumb is a guest!"
"Yeah; Mr Crumb is a cookie, Phoebe!"
"You can't eat the guests! It's strict hotel policy!"

A Sesame Street production in association with CBeebies, The Furchester Hotel is nebulously British set series about a hotel run by monsters, including Sesame's Street's Elmo and Cookie Monster. It's strictly formulaic - each episode opens with the theme song 'Welcome to the Furchester Hotel', a guest arrives, there is a problem, the Furchesters sing either 'A Furchester Never Gives Up' or 'The Catastrophe Song' depending on the scale of the problem, they put their furry heads together and solve the problem and the episode closes on 'Don't Check Out' and the end credits; at some point the Tea Time Monsters will charge through the lobby in response to the gong - but enlivened by sparky writing and energetic performances.

"I am the greatest cow sculptor in the world, or my name isn't
Henry Moo-er."

Arya loves it because it's got Cookie Monster (or, as she calls him, 'cat') in. I'm impressed by the progressive marriage in which the wife has retained her surname and the daughter has a double-barrel (Furchester-Fuzz.)

Muppets Most Wanted

So, I love the Muppets, always have done. I have always loved The Great Muppet Caper, and The Muppet Movie grew on me as I got older. Muppets Treasure Island and Muppets Christmas Carol are amazing, although Muppets from Space was a bit of a let down for me.

And then there was The Muppets, a bold gamble relaunching the franchise for a new generation. Some didn't like it, most did; I loved it, as did Hannah. And now our daughter loves the Muppets as well - the memory of sitting on the sofa, watching Elton John being savaged by crocodiles as Arya fell asleep in my arms is one I will always treasure - so naturally we went to see the advance screening of Muppets Most Wanted on Sunday.

I had a great time. The movie has all the usual Muppet energy and fun, loads of great bad jokes and songs and dances. I do have to say that, for my money, it's not as good as The Muppets, but that's not that much of a caveat.

The film begins with the Muppets left alone at the end of the last movie - and, just FYI, you may find the revelation that that heartwarming crowd scene where the Muppets were welcomed by their devoted fans is now, in-universe, written off as peopled entirely by hired extras to be utterly devastating - and segues into the first musical number, the self-deprecating 'We're Doing a Sequel'. We then meet our antagonists, 'tour manager' Dominic and Constantine, the world's most dangerous frog, and the film swiftly carries us into a story of the Muppets' comeback world tour being used as cover for a series of audacious crimes, while Kermit is replaced by Constantine and thrown in a Siberian gulag.

The plot is mostly used to string together a series of set-pieces. It's more substantial than the 'getting the band back together' riff of The Muppets, but there are two things slightly lacking. Jason Siegel's script absolutely crackled with love for the Muppets, and the new film isn't quite willing to go all in in the same way. Also, in the unpredictable manner of musicals, this time Bret Mackenzie hasn't thrown up anything to match The Muppets. 'We're Doing a Sequel' is fun, but pales beside 'Life's a Happy Song' (or 'The Rainbow Connection', 'Hey a Movie', 'Shiver My Timbers' or 'Scrooge', making it perhaps the weakest Muppet opening number of all), and the big show number, 'Something So Right', is no 'Man or Muppet', Celine Dion or no Celine Dion.

That being said, on its own lights there's a lot to like. 'I'm Number One' is a fun villain song, the gulag chorus singing 'The Big House' is both enjoyable and a nice call back to Caper, and the 'Interrogation Song' is much better than it has a right to be, thanks to the energetic byplay between Ty Burrell and Eric Jacobsen as Sam. 'I Can Get You What You Want (Cockatoo in Malibu)' is an oddity, being the most Conchordesque of the songs in the film, and sticking out in much the same way 'I'm Not Crying' did in The Pirates.

There is also the usual parade of cameos, and just as I was too young to get a lot of the cameos in The Muppet Movie the first time around, I think I'm too old to get a lot of them this time. Still, there are plenty of faces I did recognise in between the twelve year olds, and contrary to my fears from the trailers, not everyone in Europe ends up being an American doing an accent.

So, overall, Muppets Most Wanted wasn't the Muppet sequel I wanted, but it was the one that I got and I'm okay with that.