Tag: Eulogy

Jim Henson (1936-1990): Saying Goodbye 20 Years Later

by Saintmort

 

Twenty years ago, the world lost Jim Henson. I was four years old at the time, but I remember learning about his death a few months later on the television special “The Muppets Celebrate Jim Henson.” While in college years later, I purchased a bootleg of the broadcast on eBay and it’s always been one of my most prized possessions.

Jim Henson has always been my biggest influence. While movies like Star Wars and Jaws made me want to make movies, and Kevin Smith showed me that it’s possible to make it with just a cheap camera and your friends, Jim Henson taught me that anything was possible. It’s hard to reflect on a person who I never met and who died before I was out of pre-school. I could use my assumptions and write about his importance and influence on the entertainment industry, but first I want to talk about his influence and importance to me.


I was born about a year before my parents were married. They didn’t have a place to live at the time so the first year-and-a-half was spent at my mom’s parent’s house. While she went to work, my grandfather would baby-sit me and had me watch Sesame Street and The Muppet Show reruns. I’ve always loved the Muppets. As far back as pre-school I remember watching many Sesame Street VHS tapes. I’d listen to songs like Ladybug Picnic, Alligator King and Telephone Rock roughly three times a day and wore through the VHS tapes to the point where they could no longer play.

Perhaps it was because of that first year of my life that I developed a very close relationship with my grandfather. Our family would have parties and while everyone was drinking and watching football, I’d hang out with my grandpop in his music room. We’d listen to old jazz records, he’d play his banjo, and we’d always watch either the Marx Brothers, Mel Brooks or Muppet films. The Muppets helped shape my concept of comedy and their influence is noticeable in multiple comedians and comedy writers ranging from comedy troupes like The State and Stephen Lynch to directors like Lloyd Kaufman and Kevin Smith. Comedian Chris Hardwick even referred to the Muppets as one of his two biggest influences on the twelfth episode of his podcast “The Nerdist” (The following episodes his guests WERE The Muppets).

I come from a family (at least on my mother’s side) where everyone is a musician. When we’d have parties, there were always different family members performing songs. But the show stopper was when my Uncle Tommy (who was an amateur stand-up comedian/impersonator) would get a Kermit the Frog puppet and sing Rainbow Connection while my grandfather played banjo. Still, somewhere around junior high I really stopped caring about Jim Henson and the Muppets. It wasn’t like I stopped liking them – I just never thought about them any more. It wasn’t until my grandfather’s death in 2001 when they reentered my mind. The day after his funeral, I turned on the TV and was greeted by Kermit the Frog singing Rainbow Connection in the opening credits of The Muppet Movie. I immediately broke down crying. This brutal moment had reopened a door into the world of Jim Henson for me.

Every person who’s ever worked with Henson says the same thing when they’re interviewed about him: He was friendly, funny and always coming up with new ideas. In a world where it feels like every movie is full of CGI and 3-D effects, we sometimes forget how wonderful the practical effects of the past were. While movies like Deep Blue Sea and the Star Wars prequels look cheesy and dated already, a movie like Labyrinth still shines with fantastical wonderment.

It’s easy for me to say that Jim Henson is the reason I write or direct or do comedy. What people forget are the other things that Henson inspired in us and taught us. He taught many of us how to read and write through his characters on Sesame Street (and his legacy has continued to educate long after his death). He taught us to love each other, to care about each other, to believe in ourselves and of the unlimited powers of our imagination. 

What always made things work for Henson was the way he depicted his characters. They were human – legit real creations – that were so much more than just pieces of felt and ping pong balls. When you watch the Muppet Show, you identify with these characters, be it the glamorous Miss Piggy, the misunderstood Gonzo, the stuggling artist Fozzie, the always relaxed Rowlf, or Kermit, who has the most daunting task of all the Muppets: struggling to keep everything together. I sincerely believe that everyone can be connected with a Muppet. But what made these characters so special and such an impact on generations of people young and old were the ways that they interacted with each other. They fought and they performed, but at the end of the day, they cared about each other. The Muppeteers were friends, and those friendships came through in the characters.  

There’s a song lyric that has always made me think of Henson. The lyric is from the song “Pure Imagination” from the 1973 film “Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory”: “If you want to view paradise/Simply look around and view it/Anything you want to do/Want to change the world, there’s nothing to it.” Jim Henson made the world believe that anything was possible. He created wonderfully elaborate worlds in his films. He made us all believe that as long as we believed in ourselves, we would succeed. He was the living example of following your dreams.  

Jim Henson started his career on public access television with Sam & Friends, a show that almost immediately oozed Jim’s trademark off-key brand of humor and introduced future classic characters like Kermit and Rowlf the Dog. While producing the show, Henson started to experiment with techniques that forever changed the way puppetry was performed on television. Until that point, it had always been a ventriloquist act, but Henson used monitors and raised sets in order to allow puppeteers to hold puppets over their heads and watch their performances on the screens. He made a living using the puppets to make commercials, appear on talk show appearances and even directed an award-winning short film called Time Piece. However it was when Joan Ganz Cooney and the team at the Children’s Television Workshop approached him about their educational show Sesame Street that Henson truly got to shine. 

It was there that Henson began to build a legacy with a new version of Kermit the Frog, in addition to Oscar the Grouch, Bert and Ernie, Cookie Monster and Big Bird – just to name a few.  Henson always downplayed his role in the success of the show, but Cooney frequently praised his work and the Public Broadcast Service called him “the spark that ignited our fledgling broadcast service.”

Henson worried that he’d be typecast as only a children’s entertainer and began producing a series of adult sketches for Saturday Night Live, but the writers were not fans. Michael O’Donoghue famously stated, “I don’t write for felt.” It was from there that the groundbreaking Muppet Show began to grow. American Networks mostly rejected the series, feeling that the Muppets could only appeal to children, but it was with the help of a media mogul named Lew Grade that the show got made. Like most great shows, it was a slow burn to its popularity. But in 1979, Henson made The Muppet Movie, which became the 61st highest-grossing movie of all time and made the song Rainbow Connection a radio hit as well as the song most attributed to the Muppets.

The fame didn’t hold up forever, however. After the box office failure of Labyrinth and the low ratings for his television shows The Storyteller and The Jim Henson Hour, Henson began negotiations to sell the company to the Walt Disney Company to save the Muppets and give him more time on the creative side of show. Less than a year later, Henson began feeling flu-like symptoms and started feeling sick and constantly tired. Early on May 15, 1990, he was having trouble breathing and began coughing up blood. His ex-wife Jane Henson was by his side and she claimed in an interview with People Magazine that Jim thought he may be dying but didn’t want to bother going to the hospital. Jane said this was likely due to his desire to “not be a bother to people.” The following day, Henson died of pneumonia.

Someone recently put the entire funeral service on YouTube. While this might be a morbid thing, it’s an incredibly touching memorial filled with Dixieland music, singing, laughing and personal stories of favorite moments with Jim. There’s this constant struggle between great sadness and intense happiness for a great man who most of us never met. Many of the comments expressed a feeling of sorrow, as if they lost a close friend and not just a random celebrity. I completely identify with those sentiments, as there has never been another celebrity whose death has left such a feeling of emptiness inside me like Jim Henson’s passing.

In the last few months, I’ve been working on an EP planned for a July 20th release titled Musicians Celebrate Jim Henson, and one of the most impressive and inspiring things about this project for me has been the outpouring of love and respect that Jim Henson still has today. This is just one person’s opinion on a great man. If you grew up on Sesame Street or Muppet Babies, if you learned how to play drums from watching Animal, if as far as you’re concerned the only true Christmas special out there is when the Muppets visit Fozzie’s grandmother, then please use the Geekscape comments and share your fondest memories of this man. And especially remember how his great influence is still significant 20 years after his death. 

The following clip is from the 1990 TV special Muppets Celebrate Jim Henson. This clips sums up the man far better than I, or anyone else, could.

 

Stan Winston 1946-2008 – UPDATED

by profwagstaff

Hey guys, Jonathan here. I didn’t even know where to begin writing up a story on the passing of Stan Winston. You can go back through the Geekscape episodes and pick out all of the times I’ve quoted or referenced a movie that Stan had worked on or a creature he had created. Yesterday’s slow filtering news of his passing was a complete double-take inducing shock. I know that you guys have expressed in the forums how much you will miss Stan Winston and his work.

I consider myself incredibly lucky to have briefly met Stan Winston last fall during the press junket for Skinwalkers, a movie he exec produced and did the effects for. The movie was destined for gauntlet greatness from the start, but that didn’t stop Stan from gushing about the work involved in the film and the efforts put forth from everyone. It really was like spending 10 minutes in the room with a loving grandfather and a big kid stuffed into the same enthusiastic body. And the guy was funny. He didn’t flinch when I questioned him about the wolfman’s nards, but instead offered a funny reply. I walked out of that interview completely jazzed and went down the phonebook geeking out to anyone who would pick up (especially Gilmore, who helped set up the interview and was bummed he couldn’t make it).

Well Gils, I’m sorry that the chance has passed us all by. This one really hurts, my friend. Below I have a piece written by our own Professor Wagstaff from his own website which he e-mailed to me to share with you ‘scapists. Waggy put it better than I ever could, so I will leave him to it:

Special effects and makeup men are the kinds of people you can be a fan of without even realizing it. I mean, who can forget their first sight of the Terminator walking out of the fire? Or the slime dripping off of the teeth of the Alien Queen? Or the feeling they got when the camera panned up the legs of that giant brontosaurus? Or a wolfman who’s got nards?

These are all moments that sent chills and thrills up and down the spines of movie lovers everywhere. And they were all created by one man: Stan Winston, one of the greatest geniuses to hit film special effects since Ray Harryhausen made skeletons walk.

Stan died today after a long battle with multiple myeloma.

Coming to Hollywood in the late 60s, he thought that he was going to be an actor. Instead, he found a talent for makeup. In fact, he won an Emmy his first time out on a TV movie called Gargoyles.

He floated around for a while doing some low-profile work (WC Fields And Me, Dr. Black, Mr. Hyde) mixed in with some high-profile jobs (The Autobiography Of Miss Jane Pittman, “Roots,” The Wiz).

But it really wasn’t until the early 80s that people started to take notice of this genial guy with a ready smile. In 1981, he was nominated for his first Oscar for the Andy Kaufman/Bernadette Peters vehicle, Heartbeeps. (Why they chose this one to award him for, I’ll never know.) But really, The Thing was his first big break. Sure, he’s only credited with “additional makeup effects” because he took over for Rob Bottin after he got all exhausted, but what better place to start?

Then he created one of his greatest creatures: The Terminator. Never before had a mechanical man been so frightening. He would top himself two years later with the Alien Queen in Aliens. We only thought that Ridley Scott’s version of the alien was scary. Winston’s Queen was well beyond anything in our nightmares in 1986. It was enough to win him his first Oscar.

In 1987, he created the creatures for a slightly more farcical movie called The Monster Squad. It was never a big hit, but it has become quite the cult item and Stan even sort of makes a cameo in the film. His crew created the Wolfman in his image. Who knew?

1990 brought Edward Scissorhands and 1991 brought Stan’s second Oscar for Terminator 2: Judgment Day.

In 1993, Stan started a partnership with Steven Spielberg on Jurassic Park and won his third Oscar. From there, he worked on the two sequels and AI, always blending beautiful CGI work with amazing practical effects.

His most recent work has been just as amazing as ever. Iron Man’s suit is a creation that only Stan could bring to life. Unfortunately, we won’t know what kind of work he would have done on the new Terminator film. He was working on it when he died. Now it’s up to his crew at Stan Winston Digital and Stan Winston Studios to take the reigns.

Stan Winston leaves behind an amazing body of work that haunts the dreams and nightmares of moviegoers everywhere. They may not know his name (although, he is one of only two special effects artists to have a star on the Walk Of Fame), but they know his work. And they remember it forever.

You can find more Professor Wagstaff reviews and opinions at Professor Wagstaff’s official website: www.profwagstaff.com. He is the self professed Geek of All Media (and who are we to argue)!

UPDATED! Here is another Geekscapist with his personal feelings about Stan Winston’s death: news submitting monster and brother across the pond HiroProtagonist. He shares his thoughts on Stan’s accomplishments and what this loss means to him.

Monday, June 16th 2008, at around 10pm, I got back from the cinema, having been lucky enough to watch IronMan again (My local cinema runs a Mystery Movie programme on a Monday evening, and on that particular night, they chose IronMan). As with the first time I’d watched
the film, I marvelled at how good it was – not just in terms of the story and the acting, but the special effects – “I need to get me a scale-replica model of that IronMan suit”, I though, before grabbing a bite to eat, and then getting some sleep.

The following morning, after finishing my exercise for the day, I switched the TV on, and switched the Interactive Service on, and switched it to the Entertainment section – nothing really interesting on the first page, nor the second, then at the top of the third page:

“Film special effects pioneer dies”

As a self-confessed proclaimed Film Geek, the article caught my attention, ’cause I figured I might know the person the article refered to. Once it loaded, the text that appeared caused me to literally stop in my tracks:

“Oscar-winning special effecs expert Stan Winston, who created the creatures in films including

Aliens and Jurassic Park, has died at the age of 62.
Winston, who also made the robots in Terminator, died at home in California surrounded by family on Sunday.
The film veteran had been battling multiple myeloma, a plasma call cancer, for seven years, a representative of the Stan Winston Studio said.
He worked with Steven Spielberg, James Cameron and Tim Burton.”

Stan Winston dead? That’s gotta be a mistake I thought. I put it towards the back of my head, but around an hour later I went online and a quick visit to Geekscape confirmed my growing fears – it was indeed true, Stan Winston dead, aged just 62.

Born in Arlington, Virginia on April 7th 1946, Stan Winston went on to study sculpture & painting, two skills that he’d put to near-unparalled effect later on in his career, at the University of Virginia, from where he graduated in 1968, aged 22. A year later, after a brief spell at California State University he left for Hollywood, determined to pursue a career as an actor. Times were tough, and the jobs were few and far between, so eventually Stan took up an apprenticeship at Walt Disney Studios.

In 1972 Stan decided to create his own company – Stan Winston Studios, and soon won an Emmy for the companies’ work on a TV-Movie – “Gargoyles”. During the 1970s Stan & the company continued to garner multiple Emmy nominations for their work on many projects, as
well as working on the infamous Star Wars Holiday Special (Stan worked on the wookiee costumes).

Stan Winston received his first Academy Award nomination in 1982, for his work on the 1981 film Heartbeeps, however it would be two years later, when Stans work would first be appreciated by film fans around the world, with his iconic work on James Camerons’ The Terminator. The low-budget film was a worldwide hit, and propelled it’s main stars – Writer / Director James Cameron, Actor (and Future Governor of California) Arnold Schwarzenegger, and of course, Stan, to stardom. Stan, and his team continued to work through the 1980s, gaining aclaim which would reach a peak with the premier of the next collaboration between James Cameron & Stan Winston – 1986s’ Aliens, which introduced the world to another of Stans more iconic creations – The Alien Queen.

During the remainder of the 1980s Stan continued to work on a number of films, creating much loved characters & effects for, amongst others, Tim Burtons Edward Scissorhands, the Predator films, and the much-loved cult classic Monster Squad.

Towards the end of the decade Stan turned his hand to directing his own films, starting off with the horror film Pumpkinhead, and then a year later A Gnome Named Gnorm.

As the 1990s started, Stan continued to remain at the top of his field, continuing to work on some of the biggest and most memorable films of the early 1990s, such as re-teaming with James Cameron on Terminator 2: Judgement Day, for which he would receive two Academy
Awards and Tim Burton, on Batman Returns, for which he received an Academy Award nomination for Best Makeup, for his work on the characters of The Pengiun & Catwoman.

1993 would see Stan collaborate for the first time with Steven Spielberg on Jurassic Park. Stan Winston Studios worked on the dinosaur effects, combining prosthetic effects with ground-breaking Computer Generated Effects, in order to bring the world of living Dinosaurs to
life. The film went on to become the highest grossing film of all time (at the time), and landed Stan Winston his fourth Academy Award, for Best Visual Effects.

Later on in 1993, Stan Winston, along with previous collaborator and friend James Cameron, founded Digital Domain, a digital effects company that’s still heavily involved in the film world today.

As the 1990s progressed Stan and his company expanded their focus, expanding into the field of Animatronics. A prime example of the companies work can be seen in the 2001 Steven Spielberg film, A.I. Artificial Intelligence, for which Stan would receive his 10th Academy Award nomination.

As the 1990s came to an end, and a new decade started, Stan, and his company, Stan Winston Studios, continued to work on films, and their work can be seen in films such as Jurassic Park III, Big Fish, Terminator III, Constantine and the recently released IronMan.

Based on reports that have come out since Stans death, he and the company were also involved in work on forthcoming films such as James Camerons’ Avatar, Jurassic Park 4, Terminator Salvation: The Future Begins & The Suffering, as well as GI Joe & the forthcoming Martin Scorcese film Shutter Island.

So that’s Stan Winston, the Professional, however it’s only appropriate to devote some time to Stan Winston the man. Personally I never had the pleasure of meeting him, however Aint-It-Cool-News have started up an article, which can be found at http://www.aintitcool.com/node/37109 At the time of writing some of the people who’ve contribued their thoughts on Stan include past collaborators James Cameron (Terminator, Aliens, Terminator 2: Judgement Day) and John Favreau (Zathura & IronMan).

Now, from a personal point-of-view, I guess the reason why I felt like I had to type something up, in order to remember Stan by is for the simple reason that his work had a hell of an impact on me, as a film geek. I’m not an animator, nor do I work in the film industry (for which y’all
should consider yourselves very, lucky :bigsmile: ), but I love movies. They’re my addiction, pretty much every spare penny I have goes on buying new DVDs, or going to the cinema. And like all addictions, good or bad (mostly bad, I’ll concede), there has to be a spark, something that pulls the trigger, and pulls you in. And the simple fact, is that although I started going to the cinema pretty late on in life – the first film I watched in the cinema was Dennis (based on Dennis the Menace), when I was 10, it didn’t really grab me, and hook me, until a few months later, when I went to the cinema again, with my GrandDad to go and watch a lil’ film called Jurassic Park. And that was the film that started the love affair with cinema.

And, I believe that I owe equal thanks for that film, to both Steven Spielberg, and Stan Winston. Admitedly it’s a Steven Spielberg film, based on a Michael Crichton book, but the simple fact (at least as far as I’m concerned), is that, put simply, the film wouldn’t have worked, were it not for awe-inspiring combination of special effects, and plain old-fashioned, yet kick-ass animatronics that Stan & his studio created. A lot was made back then (and, indeed, now), about how Jurassic Park represents a milestone in the world of CGI, which I wholeheartedly agree with, however, for me it also represented a significant leap into the world of combining CGI with animatronics.

And for that 10 year-old boy, sitting in a cinema, both terrified (say what you will, for a 10 year old those dinosaurs were scary as hell ), it started a love affair with cinema that continues to this day. Stans’ death is indeed a sad day for many a film geek around the world, however I think we should also take a few minutes to remember just what an amazing impact his work has had, both on the next generation of film makers, effects wizards, etc, etc, who would follow his work, and attempt to top it, but also the legions of film fans around the
world, most of whom would name a film that Stan worked on, as amongst their favourites.

Stan Winston is survived by his wife of 37 years Karen, and his two children, Debie & Matt. He eaves behind him an industry that has developed into a booming business, which personally, I don’t think would have progressed to the level that is has, were it not for the work of Stan and his two companies – Digital Domain & Stan Winston Studios, who I’m sure will continue to produce work that makes helps transform the realms of imagination into cinematic reality, for many years to come.

Rest in Peace.

Stan Winston – 1946: 2008

Ollie Johnston: 1912-2008

by Jonathan

 

This morning I was thrown into a bit of reflection when Harry Knowles over at AICN ran a story about the passing of Ollie Johston. As of my last checking, IMDB has yet to pick up on this news. Harry says that he has known about Ollie Johnston almost his entire life. And it’s not hard to believe. Ollie Johnston was one of the Nine Old Men who, with Walt Disney, animated the classic Disney films and cartoons that we all grew up with.

We have ALL known Ollie Johnston our entire lives. We just didn’t know him by name. You’ve seen his animated characters countless times and you’ve even seen his face. Ollie Johnston, along with his best friend Frank Thomas, cameod in both of Brad Bird’s movies The Iron Giant and The Incredibles. Bird credits the pair as both his friends and his teachers. I was sitting in a press screening for The Forbidden Kingdom (expect a review tomorrow) and I overhead a conversation in the row behind me in which a woman was going on and on about how perfect the Pixar films are. They are perfect because John Lassetter and Brad Bird and all of the animation directors at Pixar worshipped in the church of the Nine Old Men!

My story about Ollie Johnston and Frank Thomas is a bit different than Harry’s. During the summer of 2005 I was broke. Flat broke. In March, I had finished my work as a runner PA on the Kirstie Alley show Fat Actress and was looking for work. Up to this point, in two years in Hollywood, every job that I had was either as a runner or as a PA. Some of these stories are so rage-inducingly horrible that to share them with you now would be to invite the shattering of your own souls and your abandonment of cinema forever. Okay, it was bad and I was broke, but it wasn’t THAT bad. The consistency of my blood was mainly top ramen at that point.

Anyhow, in early May I received a phone call from an Austin friend who was leaving a job and wanted to know if I could take over. I didn’t care what it was. I had to take it. I asked what it entailed. “Being an office assistant.” For who? “A documentary filmmaker and his wife.” Oh man… I was getting further and further away from the box office Hollywood dreams with every word! What’s he done? “His name is Ted and he made a movie called Frank and Ollie. His dad animated the spaghetti scene in Lady and the Tramp.” Huh?!? What?!? My mind flashed back to being 8 and learning to read Spanish from a Donald Duck comic book on the steps of a pharmacy in Ajijic, Mexico while visiting my grandparents. My entire childhood was in worship of Mickey Mouse. Financial needs aside, I had to take this job!

Theodore and Kuniko lived 5 minutes away. Their office was local and they needed help with phones and transcriptions on some older projects plus a new documentary that they had in production. They were laid back and incredible to work with. I’ll tell you all about the new documentary as soon as Ted says it’s ready for festivals or exhibition but it is Disney history related. And for those few months that I worked for Theodore Thomas Productions, I felt as though I was showing up every morning to step into a time machine to my childhood.

For weeks I transcribed interviews that had been done with original Imagineers, animators, John Lassetter, Roy Disney, Brad Bird, you name it. This was footage that would end up mostly on the editing room floor in lieu of snippets and sound bites. But I got the lucky job of seeing and hearing how these people related to each other and worked with each other on a daily basis! After two years of seeing how I didn’t want Hollywood to work… I was finally seeing how Hollywood should! I was seeing how the magic that you and I joke about, actually was created by every day people doing their jobs!

Ted’s resemblance to his father Frank is incredible. Like Frank, Ted is a jazz musician. He sported a cool beatnick goatee and was excited about my beginning music video work. He and Kuniko acted like my biggest fans whenever I would show them my latest project or relay to them the latest news. Frank showed me photos of his dad and Ollie Johnston working alongside Walt Disney in the new Burbank offices after the company left the studio in Silver Lake. I watched interview footage of Ollie Johnston talking about how he got Walt into trains or the jokes they would tell or pranks they would pull.

In a few months, Hollywood suddenly became closer and working within it became more attainable. Watching films today or reading gossip rags or overhearing rumors you can quickly assume that the system does not work. You can become very cynical of anything and everything around you. Thousands and thousands of young filmmakers and aspiring creatives move out here every year but turn right back around when they are met with the intense negative climate associated with the industry. It’s a rat race with more rats than cheese.

But that summer with Ted and Kuniko taught me that you can’t focus on the rats. You have to focus on the mice. You have to celebrate the mice and you have to celebrate being a mouse. You have to do good and you have to do good work. You have to love to do it. Frank and Ollie loved what they did. I transcribed the love and saw photos of the love. We all sat in front of a television or in a theater as kids and RECEIVED that love through our eyes and ears. Frank and Ollie and the original Disney animators had talent in spades. But the inkwell that they dipped their talented pens into was the love for what they did. Magic was just the byproduct.

I love working. I loved working for Ted and Kuniko. I loved listening to the old stories and watching the footage of how the love of storytelling can overpower any myopic studio decision or cut-throat firing. Those months in the summer of 2005 recalibrated completely and refueled my creative engines. I haven’t looked back since. Hell! The main character in my project Singledom is a fledgling animator! I am SO thankful for this short period in my life!

The world of entertainment lost one of their biggest grandfathers in Ollie Johnston. But be thankful for all of the people that he has inspired in his time here. We will feel their magic but we may not yet know them all by name.

Frank and Ollie (Special Edition) and Walt – The Man Behind the Myth are both available for purchase or Netflixing. I highly recommend both of them for a better picture of Ollie Johnston, Frank Thomas and this incredible period in storytelling.