Will Scarlet
02-07-2006, 09:51 PM
Ulster's new muppets
Big Bird's Big Job
Lindy McDowell
01 February 2006
Even by the exotic standards of previous peace-makers who've visited our shores - from the Dalai Lama to Bono, from Bill Clinton to that bloke who used to walk around with the life-size wooden cross over his shoulder - the latest emissary of love and harmony now winging his way in our direction is something else again.
He's eight feet of yellow canary.
Big Bird, star of stage, screen and Sesame Street is the latest world figure to be drafted in to try to solve our historic quarrel.
Along with the rest of the cast, he is set to appear in a series of specially made episodes of the show aimed at our small, sectarian children. (And we know we have any number of small, sectarian children because recent University of Ulster research revealed that kids as young as three have been recorded reflecting the bigotry of the adult population.)
Hence the arrival of the Sesame Street puppet peace corps and their aim to convey via the medium of large feathered creatures, letters and basic numerals, the solution to 800 years of internecine strife in Ireland.
This is inspired thinking. Whoever would have thought that the key players in the Northern Ireland peace process could be represented as a band of Muppets?
The customising of the show in order to get a specific message across has already been used in places such as the Middle East (where the aim has also been to promote peace) and in South Africa (to raise awareness of HIV/AIDS.) Local character names and customs are used.
But will it work here?
The first hurdle producers are likely to face with a Norn Iron Sesame Street is the question of location. Which side of the interface is the street on? Is there a Sesame Street Concerned Residents' Group? Or a Sesame Street Love Ulster Committee?
With the addition of Celtic and Rangers shirts it would, of course, be fairly easy to portray two of the show's characters (say, Elmo and Grover) as representative of different sides of the community.
But Oscar the Grouch would have to move out of his dustbin. Bearing in mind that the action may indeed take place on the interface, the bin will be needed for storage of petrol bombs, golf balls, paving stones and other assorted missiles during the traditional bout of recreational rioting.
Kermit the Frog doesn't need to change. Much. But in the interests of parity of esteem, he may need to get a bit more inclusive with his catchphrase: "It's not easy being green."
It's not easy being orange either, Kermie.
Bert and Ernie could be revamped as Tone and Bertie, two not-terribly-sharp blokes who confuse everybody with their relentlessly upbeat but meaningless drivel.
And Big Bird himself? Given his vivid colouring, I was going to suggest he could be a UDA brigadier. Or even Peter Hain. But since he's a singing canary, maybe Denis Donaldson?
Localising the characters and making the show relevant to local underage bigots, won't be the greatest challenge facing Sesame Street.
It will be how to bring together the youngest generation in a place which has never been more divided.
As Big Bird himself might say, that's a conundrum brought to the show's producers today by the letters SF and DUP, the numbers 1690 and 1916 and the colours orange and green.
http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/opinion/story.jsp?story=677707
Big Bird's Big Job
Lindy McDowell
01 February 2006
Even by the exotic standards of previous peace-makers who've visited our shores - from the Dalai Lama to Bono, from Bill Clinton to that bloke who used to walk around with the life-size wooden cross over his shoulder - the latest emissary of love and harmony now winging his way in our direction is something else again.
He's eight feet of yellow canary.
Big Bird, star of stage, screen and Sesame Street is the latest world figure to be drafted in to try to solve our historic quarrel.
Along with the rest of the cast, he is set to appear in a series of specially made episodes of the show aimed at our small, sectarian children. (And we know we have any number of small, sectarian children because recent University of Ulster research revealed that kids as young as three have been recorded reflecting the bigotry of the adult population.)
Hence the arrival of the Sesame Street puppet peace corps and their aim to convey via the medium of large feathered creatures, letters and basic numerals, the solution to 800 years of internecine strife in Ireland.
This is inspired thinking. Whoever would have thought that the key players in the Northern Ireland peace process could be represented as a band of Muppets?
The customising of the show in order to get a specific message across has already been used in places such as the Middle East (where the aim has also been to promote peace) and in South Africa (to raise awareness of HIV/AIDS.) Local character names and customs are used.
But will it work here?
The first hurdle producers are likely to face with a Norn Iron Sesame Street is the question of location. Which side of the interface is the street on? Is there a Sesame Street Concerned Residents' Group? Or a Sesame Street Love Ulster Committee?
With the addition of Celtic and Rangers shirts it would, of course, be fairly easy to portray two of the show's characters (say, Elmo and Grover) as representative of different sides of the community.
But Oscar the Grouch would have to move out of his dustbin. Bearing in mind that the action may indeed take place on the interface, the bin will be needed for storage of petrol bombs, golf balls, paving stones and other assorted missiles during the traditional bout of recreational rioting.
Kermit the Frog doesn't need to change. Much. But in the interests of parity of esteem, he may need to get a bit more inclusive with his catchphrase: "It's not easy being green."
It's not easy being orange either, Kermie.
Bert and Ernie could be revamped as Tone and Bertie, two not-terribly-sharp blokes who confuse everybody with their relentlessly upbeat but meaningless drivel.
And Big Bird himself? Given his vivid colouring, I was going to suggest he could be a UDA brigadier. Or even Peter Hain. But since he's a singing canary, maybe Denis Donaldson?
Localising the characters and making the show relevant to local underage bigots, won't be the greatest challenge facing Sesame Street.
It will be how to bring together the youngest generation in a place which has never been more divided.
As Big Bird himself might say, that's a conundrum brought to the show's producers today by the letters SF and DUP, the numbers 1690 and 1916 and the colours orange and green.
http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/opinion/story.jsp?story=677707