Greetings, Muppet fans! Do you remember a few months ago when we couldn't go a day without having a News Update featuring loads and loads of cameo rumors, on-set pictures, Jason Segel interviews, and more all about this fall's The Muppets? Well, since they wrapped filming news has been pretty quiet from the Mouse House and the mouth of Segel--that is, until yesterday, when all smell broke loose (it smelled like strawberries) (rethinking that... this could be a bad sign).Tuesday was CinemaCon 2011 in Las Vegas where all the big studios (Paramount, Dreamworks, Disney) got together to show off their biggest upcoming features to theater owners wanting to get butts in their seats (or seats in their seats, even). Disney's big show included action sequences from Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides, revealed that the Monsters, Inc. sequel would in fact be a prequel, and showed off stuff from Winnie the Pooh. But... of course you don't care so much about that. What you want to know is... what the heck did they say about The Muppets?!
Well, it turns out... a lot. According to quite a few sources (including The Hollywood Reporter), Jason Segel and Amy Adams were on hand to introduce the first official footage from the film. The Reporter states that "Disney impressed" with the footage, which is either journalistic fancy wording or a really good sign. Jason and Amy also revealed that there are four new songs in the film, along with callbacks to classic Muppet songs, as reported by LatinoReview. (e.g., "Rainbow Connection," "Mahna Mahna," which we had heard about previously.) Also semi-notable... this article confirms that Miss Piggy is relocated in Paris after the Muppets separate in the film. The Wrap also highlighted Segel's joking that, "I do not do any full frontal nudity. Kermit on the other hand..."Then yesterday the news kept coming in, especially from CinemaBlend, which posted an exclusive, awesome video interview with Segel and Adams along with a very enlightening article about what was included in the footage shown and what else went down at the presentation. Be sure to read the article then watch the video below:
I don't know about you... but that video not only made my day (yesterday), but it made me even more incredibly excited for this movie--which I didn't know was possible (okay, yes I did). The tone that Jason and Amy have already is exactly perfect for the film and if they carry that through the movie--even plussing it--then we are in for quite a treat. I love Amy saying, "We're really putting on a show!" and "It takes a real, concerted effort to be joyful." I am so excited to have both of these incredibly talented actors to play along with the Muppets in this movie. And I firmly believe that it is going to be nothing but joyful.
Finally, our friends over at StitchKingdom confirmed that the title treatment we showed off in January is indeed the official title treatment for The Muppets. Make sure you enlarge the picture on the webpage linked above to see it hi-res. The Kermit M is textured and fuzzy and I love it. (PS - That logo makes an epic desktop background... just sayin'.)And in case you somehow still don't know...
The Muppets will be released in United States theaters on November 23, 2011
The Muppet Mindset by Ryan Dosier
