Winnie the Pooh

Pooh, about to awaken Kermit the Clock in Cartoon All-Stars to the Rescue

Winnie the Pooh was first created by A. A. Milne in 1926 but rose to international recognition with the release of the Disney animated featurettes of the 1960s. When performing "Cottleston Pie" on The Muppet Show, Rowlf referred to it as a tune that Winnie the Pooh sang "when his brain felt fluffy." He also mentiones that he used to read Winnie the Pooh stories when he was a puppy.

The animated Disney versions of Pooh Bear and Tigger appeared with the Muppet Babies in the 1990 animated television special Cartoon All-Stars to the Rescue. Jim Cummings provided the voices of both characters.

In 2001, Bear in the Big Blue House creator Mitchell Kriegman helmed a new Winnie the Pooh series involving Bunraku-style puppetry combined with digital backgrounds. The new series, titled The Book of Pooh and produced outside of Jim Henson Productions, used most of the same voices as the animated version but with many Muppet alumni puppeteering the characters, and other crew hold-overs. Both Bear in the Big Blue House and Book of Pooh were shown in the Playhouse Disney block of programming on The Disney Channel. Characters from both shows also share the stage in Playhouse Disney: Live on Stage at the Disney-MGM Studios.

Connections

• Jennifer Barnhart performed Owl on The Book of Pooh
• Phil Baron voiced Piglet in Welcome to Pooh Corner (1984-1987)
• Brenda Blethyn voiced Mama Heffalump in Pooh's Heffalump Movie (2005)
• Tyler Bunch performed Tigger on The Book of Pooh
• Stephanie D'Abruzzo recorded the voice and occasionally supplied puppetry for Kessie the bird on The Book of Pooh
• Faz Fazakas played Winnie the Pooh on Shirley Temple's Storybook (1960) and on stage for Bil Baird from 1967 until 1969.
• Olga Felgemacher played Christopher Robin in Baird's stage Winnie the Pooh in 1971
• Harry Gregson-Williams provided the musical score for The Tigger Movie (2000)
• Tom Guadarrama was technical director and video engineer on The Book of Pooh
• BJ Guyer puppeteered on The Book of Pooh
• Dan Haskett animated on Winnie the Pooh and a Day for Eeyore
• Brian Hohlfeld wrote the screenplay for Piglet's Big Movie (2003) and Pooh's Heffalump Movie (2005)
• John Hurt voiced the narrator in The Tigger Movie (2000)
• Eric Jacobson performed Piglet on The Book of Pooh
• Tim Lagasse puppeteered on The Book of Pooh
• Peter Linz puppeteered Winnie the Pooh (lip-synching to Cummings voice) on The Book of Pooh
• Paul McGinnis performed Rabbit on The Book of Pooh
• Noel McNeal also performed Rabbit on The Book of Pooh
• Jerry Nelson played Piglet in Bil Baird's stage version of Winnie the Pooh, 1967-1969
• Patricia Parris voiced Kanga and Christopher Robin's Mother in The New Adventures of Winnie the Pooh (1987-1992)
• Chris Renaud was production designer on The Book of Pooh
• Will Ryan voiced Rabbit in Winnie the Pooh and a Day for Eeyore and Rabbit, Tigger, and Eeyore's singing voice on Welcome to Pooh Corner
• David Warner played the narrator in Pooh's Grand Adventure (1997)
• Frank Welker voiced bees and frogs in The Tigger Movie (1999)
• Victor Yerrid puppeteered on The Book of Pooh