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Mother Goose Stories title card.
| Premiere | August 28, 1990[1] |
| Network | Disney Channel |
| Seasons | 3 |
| Episodes | 39 |
The goslings and Mother Goose.
Jim Henson's Mother Goose Stories is a television show hosted by Mother Goose, who tells her three goslings the stories behind well-known nursery rhymes.
The show combined live-action child actors with elaborate puppets from Jim Henson's Creature Shop. The show featured puppeteers Mike Quinn, Mak Wilson, and Karen Prell as various characters, along with Angie Passmore as the titular Mother Goose. Fourteen of the episodes were based on stories in L. Frank Baum's 1897 book Mother Goose in Prose, while the others were original tales written for the show. The general look of the characters was based on the work of Maxfield Parrish, the artist who illustrated Baum's book.[2]
The series was originally conceived as a co-production between the Jim Henson Company and TSW for British television. A pilot episode, the story of "Humpty Dumpty", was produced in 1987 along with other episodes. The series was considered for a network slot in 1987, but was passed on.[3] The first release of the series came in 1988 through a home video release as part of Jim Henson's Play-Along Video. The video featured three episodes of the show, "Little Miss Muffet", "A Song of Sixpence" and "Boy Blue", plus original linking footage between each story.
The series finally found a home as a broadcast series on the Disney Channel in 1990, and was the company's first new television series to debut after the death of Jim Henson. Mother Goose Stories had three production seasons, spawning thirty-nine eight-minute episodes. For airing on the Disney Channel, the 39 independently produced episodes were grouped into 13 broadcast episodes to fit the half-hour time slot. Each of these broadcast episodes was comprised of three separate stories (with individual opening titles and closing credits attached to each one).
The first and third seasons of Mother Goose Stories were directed by Brian Henson, in one of his earliest directorial efforts for The Jim Henson Company, while Michael Kerrigan directed the episodes in the second season. Henson and Kerrigan received a Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Directing in a Children's Program for their work on the show.
Awards
- Daytime Emmy Awards
- Outstanding Directing in a Children's Series (Brian Henson, Michael Kerrigan)
- Outstanding Achievement in Costume Design (Mark Storey, Jacqueline Mills, Jill Thraves)
- ACE Awards
- Best Achievement in Children's Programming
- Best Achievement in Art Direction in a Comedy or Music Special/Series (Gordon Toma, Dennis King)
- Best Achievement in Writing in a Children's Series (David Angus).
- American Film and Video Association
- Honorable Mention in the Children's Video Entertainment awarded to Jim Henson's Play Along Video: Mother Goose Stories
Credits
- Created and Produced by: Roberta Jimenez Kurtz
- Directed by: Brian Henson, Michael J. Kerrigan
- Written by: David Angus
- Music by: Linda Danly, Mimi Danly
- Puppeteers: Mike Quinn, Mak Wilson, Karen Prell, Angie Passmore
- Designers: Ron Mueck, Jamie Courtier
- Puppets Created by: Jim Henson's Creature Shop
See also
Sources
- ↑ Roush, Matt. "TV Commentary; The week was pumped up on all fronts".
- ↑ Bacon, Matt. No Strings Attached. p. 67
- ↑ Nathanson, Paul. "Bonner set to replace Allan in top ITV children's slot". Campaign. October 30, 1987.