There has been talk for the last couple of years about a dark Muppet movie developed by Brian Henson to be released by Lionsgate. Director Todd Berger recently answered some questions about the project at the premiere of his new film, IT’S A DISASTER.
The tone of the film: “I want to try to make the HEAT of puppet movies. I want to be THE DARK KNIGHT or HEAT but in a world where puppets and humans coexist. Brian was like, ‘This mystery actually needs to be interesting so that even if you took all the comedy out of it, it’s still going to be interesting to watch.”
How hard of an R will it be? “It is full-on R. There is swearing, there’s sex, violence, murder. There’s no way. Maybe with some work it could be PG-13 but as of now we’ve embraced the R rating.”
Will we recognize any characters in the film? “Brian has actually already been working on the main character puppet. The Creature Shop has already made a few test puppets that I’ve met in person that are amazing. Then the whole world, because it’s not associated with The Muppets which are owned by Disney, it’s a movie in which puppets and humans coexist and a lot of the supporting characters are all puppets. So they have a puppet improv group called Stuffed & Unstrung that tours around America doing improv shows. They’re going to use a lot of those puppets but they’re also going to create a bunch of new ones. There’s a whole cast of characters in the script that they’re going to create from scratch.”
Sounds like a Muppet version of WHO FRAMED ROGER RABBIT? which is okay by me. I love the aspect of a noir/dark comedy set in this type of world.
Berger also explained the status of his movie version of WHERE’S WALDO? He mentions the plot is under wraps but it will be an adventure story utilizing the trademark red and white striped character.