But they are also commonplace and, by nature, lifeless. Jim admitted that he didn't understand the book himself, and that everyone would understand it—or not understand it—in their own way. I come up puppeteering from an actors perspective and I put my energy into it that way and perform it through whatever emotions [the characters are] feeling. If you grew up in the ’80s or are old enough to still remember VCR tapes, you may remember The Dark Crystal (1982): the Jim Henson fantasy drama with a cast of all puppets.While the style of puppets slightly resembles Henson’s Muppets, the creatures of Thra – a made-up world ruled by magical forces – are darker, more realistic. We greet them with interest and with apprehension. The film was billed as the first live-action film to feature just puppets and no humans. I don’t know if you can picture a puppeteer carrying a concrete block – probably very, very similar.
They held this massive audition list, with what seemed like every puppeteer in the world. I don’t know how to put it, but, Deet is like my soul. In order to get that performance, you have to put so much of yourself into it.
Puppets dominate Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance, but it does feature some CG enhancements.
What is your relationship like with the characters you play? It sounded like quite a small part, so I thought, “Great!
She’s a bit naive, I’m a bit naive. I was just delighted to have been able to be in that room.
You can sense the air around the characters. The spiritual kernel of The Dark Crystal is heavily influenced by Seth. The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance, a new series on Netflix, is perhaps not meant for viewers who don’t readily identify as fantasy nerds — nor for the faint of heart.
In 1976, Henson had come across the work of illustrator Brian Froud, who was known for his vivid and sinister creations of fantastical creatures. At that time, Henson was at the height of his career and churning out hugely popular television shows and films centered on Kermit, Miss Piggy and the rest of the Muppet gang. There are some computer-generated backgrounds in "Age of Resistance" and other bits of digital housekeeping. “It’s a world of fire, there’s an inner sun and there is another race of Gelfling-like creatures called The Firelings, so it’s all very cinematic. Green-screen effects were used to remove puppeteers, but there is no attempt to disguise the fabricated nature of the figures and the sets they inhabit. Netflix’s prequel to late Muppet man Jim Henson’s 1982 movie “The Dark Crystal,” “The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance,” is nearly all puppets, nearly all the time. The Dark Crystal is a 1982 film conceived by Jim Henson, the inexhaustible creator of The Muppets. It’s really hot, it’s really sweaty, it’s really heavy. There were times watching "Age of Resistance" that I, as an adult who has not slept with the light on since high school, had to pause an episode to catch my breath.
Everything was the first time.
The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance is set on Thra many years before the events of The Dark Crystal. And with CGI, we can make some really great, crazy, fantasy creatures and worlds. Being a trained actor in addition to a puppeteer, how do the two inform one another? The film was meant to be frightening, and the series, which has more opportunity for tension and torture — it’s five times longer than the movie, basically the length of the “Lord of the Rings” trilogy — can make Punch and Judy look like a love duet. Column: RBG’s death puts the rule of law and the Constitution on November ballot, [Most read] No officers charged directly with Breonna Taylor’s death in Louisville, one officer indicted for shooting into neighboring apartments, [Most read] Gale Sayers, the Chicago Bears’ Hall of Fame running back, dies at 77: ‘He was poetry in motion. Puppeteering rules to live by? The Dark Crystal is a 1982 film conceived by Jim Henson, the inexhaustible creator of The Muppets. Henson got his start while still in college with "Sam and Friends" on a local station out of Washington, D.C. Before "Sesame Street" bowed in 1969, Muppets played "The Ed Sullivan Show" and Rowlf the Dog was a regular on country singer Jimmy Dean's variety hour.
(That Oz was Miss Piggy ought to be basic cultural knowledge.) This marriage of digital, with just a little enhancement to our physical puppetry, I think is great.
Technical advances give the Gelflings a greater range of expression, fortunately, for they have more — and more varied — acting to do here. It’s like the muscles that you need to use for this part just don’t exist. Louis Leterrier isn’t just the man who helped shepherd the incredible Dark Crystal … There is a repertoire of techniques and technologies designed by Henson and his collaborators, a choreographic style as recognizable as Martha Graham's or Twyla Tharp's, a physical vocabulary of head shakes, mouth gapes, hand flops, bouncy walks.