Did Frank Oz like the most recent Muppets movie?

Frank Oz, the voice of countless ‘Muppets’ including Miss Piggy and Fozzie Bear, opted not to get involved in last year’s “The Muppets”- mainly because he apparently didn’t like the direction the film was headed in and, more so, had his own ideas on how to relaunch the film series.

Collider caught up with Oz, now a bonafide filmmaker (I love his movie “Bowfinger”!), to ask whether he ended up seeing “The Muppets”, in which another actor ended up voicing the characters Oz usually does.

His response? diplomatic but… well, you can tell he doesn’t think much of the movie.

“I saw it. I have not talked about it because—I gotta be careful here because I don’t wanna hurt anybody—the Disney process bothered me. I felt the movie was really sweet and fun, a little too safe, a little retro; I prefer more cutting edge with The Muppets. But the main thing is everybody got back to appreciating The Muppets, and what I wish they’d appreciate is the performance underneath The Muppets; those are the key people. So I thought the movie was…the main thing is it brought people back to The Muppets. Although they never really left, it’s always been a kind of subculture, it’s always been there in our popular culture a little bit. So I’m happy that people are happy.”

Oz said he’s not sure if he will get involved in any future “Muppets” movie a this stage. Sad.

UPDATE! Thanks to Muppets fan ‘Fred’ who stitched up some inaccuracies for us in this article, here’s Fred…

It states that “Frank Oz, the voice of countless ‘Muppets’ including Miss Piggy and Fozzie Bear, opted not to get involved in last year’s “The Muppets”- mainly because he apparently didn’t like the direction the film was headed in and, more so, had his own ideas on how to relaunch the film series.”

While statement is partially true, it is not the whole truth. In fact, Frank Oz retired from Muppet performing in early 2000 so he could focus on his directing career. This new Muppet film was NOT the reason for leaving the Muppets, He had already retired from them years ago.

In addition, the article states “Collider caught up with Oz, now a bonafide filmmaker…to ask whether he ended up seeing “The Muppets”, in which another actor ended up voicing the characters Oz usually does.

his statement is not correct at all. Frank Oz stopped performing his “Muppet Show” characters back in 2000. This “other actor” is puppeteer Eric Jacobson, and has been performing Oz’s characters for years. In fact, since Oz is now retired, Jacobson is now the principal performer of nearly all of Oz’s characters from both “Muppet Show” and “Sesame Street” (except Cookie Monster, David Rudman performs him.) Jacobson is not some “new guy” that they got just for this film, he has been the principal performer of Oz’s characters for years now.

Most people don’t even realize that Oz retired from Muppet performing in early 2000. And there are many misconceptions about his current Muppet status.

And quite frankly, the main reason why Oz is “not sure if he will get involved in any future “Muppets” movie” is because he has retired and that is a finished chapter in his life. He choose to distance himself from Muppets