Make Art Make Money: Lessons From Jim Henson on Fueling Your Creative Career (12 page)

To be fair, Bailey said that Al Gottesman was not a shark:
“I never needed ‘people’ to talk to Jim’s ‘people.’ I could talk to Al myself.”
^[48]
Yet the “sharkiness” of money negotiations was not something Henson wanted to
engage in while he was working with an artist.

As a boss, Henson’s hiring methods were quite
careful
,
but they weren’t exactly
professional
. They caused confusion, but they
also created a lot of great collaboration, because decisions were based on
criteria that had nothing to do with business, salaries, contracts, or per diem
expenses. Michael Frith, an illustrator, had been working for Dr. Seuss when he
heard about
Sesame Street
and “wondered if there might be some synergy
there.”
^[49]
When we navigate our professional careers, we tend to move towards quantifiable
increases, greater money, and higher titles; we don’t change jobs on the whim
of some
potential
“synergy.” But recall that Frith would spend many late
nights working on a
Sesame Street
encyclopedia or a Miss Piggy
photograph. For people who work day and night, the line between job and life is
indistinguishable, and so is the line between coworker and friend. Most parents
won’t tell their children to chase synergy over salary, but the artists who
worked with Henson did.

ADDENDUM TO LESSON 3
WHY PEOPLE WORK FOR YOU

The downside to placing synergy over salary is obvious. When
Caroll Spinney left his job to puppeteer for
Sesame Street
, he didn’t
know what kind of money he was going to make:

It was all settled except for one point—money. I
asked him what I could expect to earn.

Jim looked thoughtful and raised a finger. “We
have a tradition,” he started.

I smiled. Who doesn’t like a nice tradition?

“What is it?” I asked.

“You won’t get paid much.”

That wasn’t at all what I’d expected to hear.
After all, I was joining the Muppets, the preeminent puppet troupe in the
world. Wouldn’t I get rich quick? His first offer was two hundred dollars a
week. I was making almost that much a day in Boston on
Bozo’s Big Top
.
^[50]

Because this was public television, even Henson
made a “shamefully low salary”
^[51]
according to Davis—not counting merchandizing. At one point, Spinney even decided
to quit
Sesame Street
because of the low pay. Puppet builder Kermit Love
saw that he was frustrated and told him to give it a month. The next week, Big
Bird was on the cover on
Time
magazine. This he describes in the chapter
of his memoir called “Take a Pay Cut.” So why did Spinney, in the middle of his
career, take a job for
less
money? He explains:

The
Bozo
show paid well, but it got so that I
hardly had to work. It wasn’t the thing I had dreamed of as a boy. I wanted
more, to educate, to do something artful, meaningful. When Jim offered me Big
Bird, I knew that was it.
^[52]

What Spinney wanted was what every artist wants—a chance to
be loved for the hard work that only
he
can do. To be rewarded for doing
one’s art. Not just a cheap, profitable derivative of one’s art, but the real
thing—the whole thing—what he was
born
to do, and do masterfully.
Spinney was born to play Big Bird. Even down to his mild cerebral palsy (his unique
postures and gestures undoubtedly translate into the distinctiveness of his
characters) and the latent artistic aspirations of his mother, who sewed
puppets for him. He developed an inimitable method involving reading glasses,
tiny folded scripts, and roller-skating backwards while puppeteering, seeing
only through a miniature, reversed-image monitor inside his suit. No one else
can play Big Bird the way Spinney does. That’s why, today, the seventy-year-old
earns over $300,000 a year.
^[53]

But in 1970, Spinney couldn’t have known how
much money the future would hold. Spinney took the pay cut because he wanted to
do the best work he could. Because, in his own words:

To me, that was the equivalent of—if I was a drummer,
having some fellow say, “I’ve got a little band from Liverpool, then, would you
like to be me drummer?” Because it was Jim Henson. Jim Henson and the Muppets
to me were the Beatles, completely, of the puppet world.
^[54]

When you have a business like Henson’s, people
work for you for reasons that go deeper than money. Joseph Bailey describes in
his memoir that he was “writing the TV show 10 hours a day.”
^[55]
Yet he was happy. “At thirty years of age,” he wrote, “I got to run away and
join the circus. The adventure lasted for 20 years.”
^[56]

Dave Goelz was an industrial designer who showed
up on set one day during his vacation. He also left a good career because he
wanted something
better
. He relates:

I started my own business doing industrial
advertising.… Jim proposed that I keep my main industrial client, come to
the Muppet Workshop as a designer/builder, and perform occasionally in
specials. It gave me the Muppet work that I was passionate about and included
several escapes to California each year.… How could I say no? So I did it.
^[57]

Karen Prell, in her own words, “bombarded Henson
Associates with fan letters and inquiries about puppet building or performing
work.” In one such letter she introduced herself by saying, “I would like to
work with the Muppets. Or at least attempt to.” It goes on to explain why:

I’ve gone through several jobs that offered security
and dental insurance, but none that gave me an opportunity to become hairy
monsters or singing animals.
^[58]

Joseph Bailey wrote in his “In Memoriam” chapter for Henson:

I’ll always remember him as
the magical ringmaster who let me turn a quirky talent into a meaningful career
and for letting me spend 20 fascinating years with his marvelous, mystical,
magical circus.
[59]

Artists work for artists for good
reason. It is because they are “passionate,” in Goelz’s words, about art; they
want to “become” something, in Prell’s words; to have a “meaningful career” in
Bailey’s. To some people, that is more important than security and dental
insurance.

On the other hand, it can
be tempting to assume that
everyone
is, in some sense, an artist.
Perhaps we are all born artists, but when it comes to finding dedicated
collaborators, that simply isn’t true.

QUALIFICATION TO ADDENDUM
NOT
EVERYONE
WANTS TO WORK FOR YOU

In 1980, a poll asked secretaries whom they’d most like to
work for. In the poll, Jim Henson—at the height of his career—was just about as
attractive to the secretaries as “the ‘average employer’—3 percent.” Many more
women, it seemed, would like to work for Phil Donahue—the overwhelming winner
with 18 percent. Other more preferable bosses included Erma Bombeck, Alan Alda,
Dan Rather, and President Carter.
^[60]
While it is notable to be on the list at all, it would be wrong to say that
everyone
wanted to work at Jim Henson’s magical circus.

Some people will always want to work for someone
more powerful, more handsome, or more charming. Not everyone, it seems, is a
Fraggle. Not everyone wants to dance their cares away.

And perhaps that’s the beauty of a nuanced
phrases like “Why don’t you come talk about working?” It’s a quiet question
that requires an overwhelming affirmative in order to truly connect. Not
everyone
wants to work for you. But some people really,
really
want to work for
you. If Spinney hadn’t really wanted to, he wouldn’t have joined Henson. Prell
had to write multiple letters to get in. Henson’s quiet method effectively
sought these people out and brought them into his group. And while Caroll
Spinney could have begrudged Henson for hiring him at lower wages than he’d
like, he didn’t. Everyone who worked for Henson seemed to express gratitude for
what they say was a positive experience. He let them create and achieve things,
and it is hard to watch clips of Henson’s funeral service without feeling this
gratitude very deeply.

Muppet builder Caroly Wilcox later reflected on
her time in the workshop, saying, “To be given the chance to create was
something Jim did for all of us, and that was a great pleasure.”
^[61]
Jerry Juhl said of Fraggle Rock, “Jim had taken the show and taken this set of
people and said you guys are gonna do this, and I’ve always been really
grateful for it.”
^[62]
Not everyone wants to be an artist, and that’s okay. It’s not an easy
lifestyle.

SIDEBAR
ON FREELANCERS

One of the drawbacks to working as an artist is the
unpredictability of the freelance lifestyle. In the early days, Henson hired
Don Sahlin and Jerry Juhl on salary. But as he built up his repertory company
of puppeteers, many of them worked freelance, as members of a union, the American
Federation of Television and Radio Artists.

Karen Prell:

Except for when I started out on
Sesame Street
,
I was always a freelance performer, so I wasn’t constantly on staff or
anything.
^[63]

Steve Whitmire:

We’re freelancers [with Disney], we’re still
freelancers, just as we were with Henson. And that’s nice.
^[64]

With freelance jobs, work is done on a per-project basis.
There is a start and end date. Because of the union, there were acceptable
rates of pay set, and sometimes residuals. One reason Whitmire said “That’s
nice” is likely because trusted performers like him can negotiate their pay at
the start of a project and choose to sign on or not. Freelancers tend to have
more freedom in their lives, but the downside of flexibility is what it lacks—stability.

Jerry Nelson was hired to take over Rowlf the
Dog’s right hand when Frank Oz went to Europe. It was a great opportunity, but
when Oz came back, Nelson was out of a job. Nelson told an interviewer:

Well, Frank came back in ’66, and up till ’66 we did
a lot of work, and then it kinda tailed off, and Jim said, ‘Well, I don’t have
enough work for all of us, and you’re the last one to have joined, so I’m going
to have to let you go.’
^[65]

Freelancing has its ups and downs. Terry Angus,
a puppeteer for
Fraggle Rock
, didn’t go to Henson’s funeral because when
the show ended, “I was very much unemployed, had been for quite a while, and
didn’t have much money.”
^[66]
On the other hand, Caroll Spinney could eventually renegotiate his contract up
to what it is today—reportedly $314,000 a year,
^[67]
in part because of the nature of freelancing.

Jerry Nelson appreciated the freelance system
when he wanted to take time off from
The Muppet Show
to spend more time
with his daughter. She would later pass away in 1982 from cystic fibrosis.
Nelson explained:

I went to Jim and I said, “You know … I want to
go on, I want to work on the show, but I really think I have to spend this time
with Christine.” And he said, “All right.” As a consequence, I had to give up
characters like Statler, whom I had done in
Sex and Violence
and one
other show …
^[68]

Nelson was able to have freedom when he needed it. But he
had to give up something. He sacrificed a character and the money he would have
earned. Some people can sacrifice money for time. Others can’t. Hiring people
freelance is not an easy thing to do because you have to let go of them. We
know that Henson hated to lose people. Joan Ganz Cooney said:

He could never fire anybody, couldn’t accept any plan
for downsizing that was drawn up by one of his advisers. Jim feared he couldn’t
face people afterwards, so he just kept them on.
^[69]

Perhaps freelance hires were, in a way, easier on Henson, a
way to let someone go without firing them. Still, as jubilant as the journal is
when it says “Jerry joins us,” Henson is equally sad to see people go:

2/–/1965 Carroll and Muppets parted

1/1/1968 Jerry Juhl leaves us

10/–/1976 Bonnie leaves us

Parting
is clearly sweet sorrow to Henson in what
might be to another boss mere personnel change. But though freelancing makes
this situation habitual, it also makes it easy for people to return. Henson
used an exclamation mark to note:

11/1/1981 Diana B. rejoins HA!

Collaborations formed with freelancers—while not
constant—can be enduring. Many of Henson’s freelancers returned to him over the
years. Diana Birkenfield worked for a summer on
Time Piece
, then
became a full-time producer for Henson in the sixties and seventies, and later
returned to freelancing with the company in the eighties.
^[70]
Michael Frith started out as a freelance designer for
The Muppet Musicians
of Bremen
and later became the full-time Henson Associates’ art director.
^[71]

Though Jerry Juhl and Bonnie
left
Henson,
they too returned. Juhl worked from home with the help of new computer
technology. Bonnie Erickson left to start her own business, and Henson became
one of her first clients. And Jerry Nelson may have been let go when Frank Oz
came back from Europe, but Nelson returned to work on
Sesame Street
for
the rest of his career. Getting to work for Henson once often meant the chance
to work for Henson again. And from Henson’s perspective, it was perhaps the
longest audition process possible; he got to see over a span of years who would
work out and who wouldn’t.