Reposting this from Sup Forums.
Things have taken a turn for the worse, Brian actually joined in the shitflinging and has thrown Steve under the bus as well. How big a cheque did Disney give them, holy shit.
nytimes.com/2017/07/17/arts/television/kermit-the-frog-disney-firing.html
>“He played brinkmanship very aggressively in contract negotiations,” said Lisa Henson, president of the Jim Henson Company, and Jim Henson’s daughter, in a telephone interview.
>Ms. Henson said Mr. Whitmire was adamantly opposed to having an understudy for his role, which presented problems when it came to what she called “B-level performances, such as a ribbon-cutting.” She said he was unwilling to appear on some of these occasions but also refused to develop an understudy and that he “blackballed young performers” by refusing to appear on the show with them.
>Brian Henson, the company’s chairman and Jim Henson’s son, said that while Mr. Whitmire’s Kermit was “sometimes excellent, and always pretty good,” things changed when he was off set.
>“He’d send emails and letters attacking everyone, attacking the writing and attacking the director,” he said. .”
>In a reflection of Disney’s determination to undercut Mr. Whitmire, executives there also arranged an interview for a Times reporter with a producer on a Muppets-related project who expressed the same criticisms as the Henson family. The producer declined to speak for attribution, however.
For Mr. Whitmire, who didn’t respond to the criticisms leveled by the Hensons or Disney, this is the end of a professional journey that has occupied his entire adult life. His bond with the Muppets began when, at age 10, he wrote a letter to Mr. Henson asking questions about puppetry around the same time “Sesame Street” had its premiere.
