Arts & Entertainment

The 82-Year-Old Brooklyn Artist Behind Miss Piggy and the Phillie Phanatic

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Attention, sports fans! And Muppets fans. And anyone interested in the kind-of–obsessive creative types who make the world around us sparkle. You’re going to love Nell McShane Wulfhart’s profile of Bonnie Erickson, the 82-year-old Brooklyn artist behind Miss Piggy, the Phillie Phanatic, and dozens more beloved mascots and Muppets. (Statler and Waldorf! Animal and Janice! Travis Kelce’s KC Wolf!) Erickson has lived a life that makes you say, “I need to go to a cocktail party with this woman.” I didn’t know how badly I needed to know about Method acting for mascots. (“We’d always tell the performer, ‘Wear the costume while you’re making breakfast. Wear it while you’re watching TV.’ I love to picture the Phanatic sitting on the sofa, flipping from channel to channel. They needed to get used to it; it should be a second skin.”) Or the intricacies of puppet posture. Reading this story — and looking at the accompanying photos and drawings from her archive — feels like sitting down with Erickson and shuffling through her sketchbooks and photo albums.

—Marisa Carroll, executive editor, the Cut

Miss Piggy Has a Mother Everyone’s heard of Jim Henson. It’s time to give Bonnie Erickson her due.

Photo: Wayde Harrison
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