NOTES on #40

"T Time"



Here's the t on some poetic connections to Julie Andrew’s guest appearance on Season 2 of The Muppet Show.  Andrews has a history with the Muppets.  She did two television specials with them called, “One Step into Spring,” and “One to One.”



"One” is important, and in this episode, Sam the Eagle mimics Joe McCarthy, a man that was destroyed thanks to the television.  Communism is about the collective over the individual, and according to one great book, “The United States” is the child of “The United Kingdom,” and however one may say America is for individualism, individuals must die for the national collective.  Julie Andrews stars in a film called The Tamarind Seed, where issues of Communism are raised.



Before The Muppet Show premiered, Jim Henson had a group of Muppets on Saturday Night Live from The Land of Gorch.  On their last episode, they come out of filing cabinets and talk with Lily Tomlin.  That cast of Muppets is connected to royalty, and the main guy, performed by Jim Henson, is King Ploobis.  In this episode, he says, "Oh, well The Great Book speaks of our return after death..." and then another Muppet, Scred, says, "...The Great Book of Bill Baird!"



Bill Baird was a puppeteer.  One thing he is famous for is creating and choreographing "The Lonely Goatheard" on The Sound of Music, which they feature in this The Muppet Show episode.  Also featured in this episode, Julie Andrews sings, "Whistle a Happy Tune" from The King and I, as the closing number.  OK... now, how wild is this?  In the SNL episode mentioned previously, guess what Lily Tomlin does?  She sings "Whistle a Happy Tune" with the SNL Gorch Muppets!  I couldn't even believe it, and then I discovered Bill Baird had a TV show that was called, The Whistling Wizard.


Why is there a king in this poem?  America is not a monarchy…is it?!  Julie Andrews originated the role of Guinevere, wife to King Arthur, in Camelot, the musical.  In an early draft of the poem I wrote "The King of Camelot,” but after re-reading Virginia Woolf's Orlando, I thought it should say “The Fisher King."  This was perfect because Julie Andrews sings an original song to Kermit called "When You Were a Tadpole and I Was a Fish."  In the end, I decided to change it to simply, "Wounded King," because this episode is like Three Kings Day featuring:  The Wounded Fisher King, King Ploobis, and King Mongkut (The King and I).



Swinging clubs and sipping cups aside, in this poem, mom whistles like a kettle.  I learned that apparently “kettle” derives from the word "cauldron."  Many say that a cauldron was in fact the Holy Grail. Stranger, in that line, it says how children grow up to stop asking questions.  According to legend, one had to ask the right question in order to heal the Wounded King.



Other films of Julie Andrews that you can find referenced in this piece are The Americanization of Emily, Sound of Music, Victor Victoria, Mary Poppins, and The Thoroughly Modern Millie.  Other musicals include Cinderella and My Fair Lady.




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