These Are The Muppets In Your Neighborhood

Transcript

OPHIRA EISENBERG, HOST:

It's time to play a game with our very important puzzler. Let's bring back Sonia Manzano and our very special guest, Emilio Delgado.

(APPLAUSE)

EMILIO DELGADO: Hola.

EISENBERG: Emilio, it’s so nice of you to join us.

DELGADO: Gracias – muchas gracias.

(LAUGHTER)

EISENBERG: So when people blur the lines of reality and the show and assume that you are married in real life - which I think happens all the time, right?

DELGADO: It's been happening all along, I think.

EISENBERG: Yeah. Do you tell them the truth? What do you do?

DELGADO: Got to tell them the truth.

SONIA MANZANO: Well, I - like I said, we told a woman the truth once. Do you remember? We were somewhere…

DELGADO: Oh, yeah. Yeah.

MANZANO: …And a woman says, so happy that my kid had the opportunity to see real love on “Sesame Street.”

DELGADO: Yeah.

MANZANO: She'll know what real love is when she grows up.

DELGADO: Good acting.

MANZANO: And so we looked at each other, and we said, well, we should tell her the truth, and we did. We said, madam, we’re not really married. And she went, (gasps) well, as long as you really love each other.

(LAUGHTER)

DELGADO: You know, true love - what can I tell you?

EISENBERG: Emilio, what is your character, Luis, going to do on “Sesame Street?”

DELGADO: You know, quite frankly, I don't know.

EISENBERG: You don't know.

DELGADO: You know, the show is changing very fast…

EISENBERG: Yeah.

DELGADO: And so, you know, I don't know what's going to happen with these characters. I mean, I know that they turned the fix-it shop into – I don’t know. What were we? We were a…

MANZANO: A laundromat.

DELGADO: Laundromat. No, but it was a mail shop before that, you know, and I think in the last few years it became a bicycle shop. But I don't know if it's going to continue being that. Who knows?

EISENBERG: I think bikes are around for a while. I think we’re good with bikes.

DELGADO: Yeah, yeah.

MANZANO: You know what…

JONATHAN COULTON, BYLINE: They should make it a Verizon store.

(LAUGHTER)

DELGADO: Right. That’s it.

EISENBERG: Oh, my God. And then, of course, people that work there will be just sad, upset. Now the game we are going to play with you is called These are the Muppets in Your Neighborhood. Jonathan and I are going to give you a name and brief description of a “Sesame Street” Muppet, and you have to tell us, is it a real Muppet or is it one that we made up ‘cause there's been lots of different ones all over the years. So we are going to alternate between the two of you. Just tell us, is it real Muppet or fake Muppet?

COULTON: All right, Emilio, this one is for you. Stinky, a stinkweed plant who is friendly but smelly and blooms a flower out of his head on his birthday.

DELGADO: Believe it or not, that's real.

COULTON: That is real. That is a real Muppet.

(APPLAUSE)

COULTON: I want to be clear when we say real…

(LAUGHTER)

COULTON: It’s still a puppet.

DELGADO: An actual puppet, yeah.

COULTON: Right, it’s an actual puppet.

EISENBERG: What was that about?

DELGADO: Stinky?

EISENBERG: Yeah.

DELGADO: I think it had – it was part of Oscar’s thing.

MANZANO: I think it was Oscar’s plant.

DELGADO: Yeah, I think it was Oscar’s pet plant. I think that’s what it was. And he had to be stinky, of course.

EISENBERG: Right, yeah.

MANZANO: If he was going to like any flower, it had to be that.

EISENBERG: It had to be the stink weed.

DELGADO: Stink, yeah.

EISENBERG: Harvey Kneeslapper, a mustachioed practical joker who laughs at his own jokes such as asking, do you want me to keep an eye on your hat, and then smashing the hat with a giant letter I. Yes, Sonia?

MANZANO: That is a real Muppet character.

EISENBERG: Oh yes.

(APPLAUSE)

EISENBERG: Clearly modeled after my older brother.

(LAUGHTER)

MANZANO: I hope not. This puppet had great, big, yellow teeth.

DELGADO: Used to hang out with Guy Smiley.

EISENBERG: Oh yeah, they were buds.

DELGADO: Remember him?

COULTON: Imagine the trouble they must've gotten up to together. All right, Emilio, is this real or fake? Miles Millennial, a boy puppet who wants a prize for everything he does.

(LAUGHTER)

COULTON: Apologies to our younger listeners.

(LAUGHTER)

DELGADO: Yeah.

COULTON: We need your support.

DELGADO: Actually, that's a good idea for puppet, but no, it's not.

COULTON: No, it's fake. It’s totally fake. It’s all for the joke.

(APPLAUSE)

EISENBERG: All right, we’ve decided this is a little too easy, so let's make it more of a competition. Let's turn on your buzzers, and for these next ones, we’ll see who rings in first. Real or fake - Professor Hastings, a professor whose lectures are so dull he falls asleep during them.

(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)

EISENBERG: Sonia.

MANZANO: Fake.

EISENBERG: That's real. I know it seems like a terrible lesson.

MANZANO: Not to mention dreary television if the character’s falling asleep.

EISENBERG: Meryl Sheep, an acting teacher and a sheep with an accent similar to Meryl Streep's in Sophie's choice.

(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)

EISENBERG: Emilio.

DELGADO: Yes, she's real.

EISENBERG: That is real.

DELGADO: Yes.

(APPLAUSE)

EISENBERG: A little on the dark side, but real, yeah.

DELGADO: I know, but real, yeah. I remember her. Oh, she was terrific.

(LAUGHTER)

COULTON: Art Chung, how did our contestants do?

ART CHUNG, BYLINE: I'm just amazed they can remember anything from 45 years ago…

EISENBERG: Yeah.

CHUNG: …But Emilio is our winner. Congratulations.

(APPLAUSE)

EISENBERG: And now we have kind of an amazing treat. Sonia and Emilio will sing a very special “Sesame Street” song that Sonia wrote the lyrics to, accompanied by our very own Jonathan Coulton.

(APPLAUSE)

COULTON: You ready?

MANZANO: Ready.

DELGADO: Do it.

COULTON: Here we go. (Playing guitar).

DELGADO: (Singing) Each time we meet at work or the street, we always say hello, but you say…

MANZANO AND DELGADO: (Singing) Hola.

DELGADO: (Singing) And I say Hola.

MANZANO AND DELGADO: (Singing) It’s a word that we both know. Hola means hi, hello, not goodbye - why, everywhere you go.

MANZANO: (Singing) The girls say hola.

DELGADO: (Singing) The boys say hola.

MANZANO AND DELGADO: (Singing) ‘Cause hola means hello.

MANZANO: (Singing) Latins from Alaska or from Spain or fair Nebraska will say hola when they mean hello.

DELGADO: (Signing) Latins from Havana or Detroit or old Montana know that's just how the old greeting goes.

MANZANO AND DELGADO: (Singing) Latins from Queens and the hip Argentines say hola when greeting each other. We know the way we can all say hola, what's happening brother? Take it from us, and don't make a fuss. We want you in the know.

MANZANO: Come on everybody.

MANZANO AND DELGADO: (Singing) So just say hola. Come on, say hola. Say hola instead of hello.

(APPLAUSE, CHEERING)

EISENBERG: That was incredible. Oh, my God – Sonia Manzano, Emilio Delgado, (unintelligible).

(APPLAUSE, CHEERING) Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.