Lack of female Muppet monsters

[minor muppetz]

Has anybody noticed that on The Muppet Show, unlike Sesame Street, there were hardly any female monsters? The closest thing to a female monster is Mean Mama, who was sometimes portrayed as a male but also often as a female. Of course, it could be said that she was a woman who people mistakenly thought was a man. The puppet version looked male while the full-body version looked female (though the full-body version did look male in the Julie Andrews episode).

Of course, there are only three appearances I can think of where she was specifically male, and two of those could have explanations for her being male:

Milton Berle episode: She sings with a male voice, but you could say that she's a woman with a gruff man's voice (just like Susan the Monster from Greg the Bunny).
Carol Burnett episode: She dances with Piggy, but then again, Dr. Strangepork and Link dance with each other in that sketch, and they're male (and so are Statler and Waldorf, who dance togetehr), so who's to say that Mean mama wasn't a woman dancing with Piggy?
The Muppet Show Book: She replaces Beautiful Day Monster as the singers date. No explanation here (I don't think we want to say that she's gay, now do we?).

Another close thing to a female monster was Miss Kitty, but that's only becasue of his name. he's clearly a male monster, even in the sketch where he's referred to by that name. And many of us fans think that the Green Scoff is a woman.

Other than that, whenever a female monster was needed, a male monster was just dressed in drag, often with a wig.

Does anybody think that there should have been some female monsters on The Muppet Show?

 

[Timotheus]

I do seem to remember seeing a green frackle in a blonde wig dancing with another frackle whose head gets knocked off by a baseball bat...
"Look out for bat that's coming up behind you!"
"Oh, that's ok, my uncle was a vampire."
"It's not that kind of a bat..." *male frackle gets his head knocked off*

Maybe female monsters would have had a hard time competing with Miss Piggy...

 

[Gonzo14]

i agree, on Sesame Street there's Zoe and Rosita, but there wasn't too many on The Muppet Show

 

[Philip Kippel]

There is one TMS monster who was always female: the Green Scoff.

 

[minor muppetz]

I do seem to remember seeing a green frackle in a blonde wig dancing with another frackle whose head gets knocked off by a baseball bat...

The Green Frackle in drag was named Gloat. The Blue Frackle who had his head knocked off was called Boppity.

Sesame Street has had a lot of female monsters throughout the years, though now that I think of it, I don't think there were many regular female monsters on Sesame Street at he time that The Muppet Show was on. There were Deena and Pearl who were on the show from 1979-1980. I've read that the Elmo puppet was originally called Baby Monster and was around during season 2 or 3 as part of a monster family, so there could have been at least one female monster (probably a mother monster) in that family.

It seems like Sesame Street didn't have any female monsters as part of the main cast untill the late 1980s or early 1990s. I've read an interview with Karen Prell where she said that Deena was meant to be a main character, so I guess Pearl would have also been a main character. Of course, they must not have been main enough for any of their appearances to be shown on Noggin.

 

[MartyMuppets]

I seem to vaguely recall Mean Mama definetely being spoken of as male in that particular Pigs in Space sketch. I'm sure Julius Strangepork said to Piggy "Why don't you dance with him?" as a suggestion towards getting to communicate with him.
Well who knows since Mama was never actually referred to by name who's to say that there may not have been two such monsters a male and a female of the species though they were never seen together

On a side note were Link and Strangepork dancing with each other? 2 male muppets dancing together though of course nothing queer was openly implied or paraded

I see minor muppetz already made special mention of this (the things we miss) and I have seen the hecklers dancing together in At the Dance on my season one DVD collection LOL

 

[Saironi]

think the main joke behind "Miss Kitty" is that the monster has a male's voice.

There was the monster who sang "I feel pretty" with Mary Louise and another girl (both who seemed to be sporting fangs, so were they meant to be monsters, too?), but she really seemed to be more like Piggy's backing singers and was a Whatnot who could turn into a monster. Or is it likely that some monsters can look like Whatnots and not just hold the form for very long in the world of Muppets?

 

[minor muppetz]

On a side note were Link and Strangepork dancing with each other? 2 male muppets dancing together though of course nothing queer was openly implied or paraded

Yes, they were dancing in both Pigs in Space and in the backstage scene before it, for no apparant reason, though Link did dance with Annie Sue in an earlier scene. I wonder if Link would have been disqualified for switching partners (or maybe he and Annie Sue already got disqualified and Link managed to get away with dancing with Strangepork and therefore getting back in the dance marathon).

As far as other male Muppets dancing, Statler and Waldorf danced together at least twice (in a first season At The Dance sketch and in this episode), Gonzo danced with Kermit in this episode (though I think that was just meant as a joke), and two male monks danced together in the Raquel Welch episode.

 

[TheJimHensonHour]

I seem to vaguely recall Mean Mama definetely being spoken of as male in that particular Pigs in Space sketch. I'm sure Julius Strangepork said to Piggy "Why don't you dance with him?" as a suggestion towards getting to communicate with him.
Well who knows since Mama was never actually referred to by name who's to say that there may not have been two such monsters a male and a female of the species though they were never seen together

On a side note were Link and Strangepork dancing with each other? 2 male muppets dancing together though of course nothing queer was openly implied or paraded

I see minor muppetz already made special mention of this (the things we miss) and I have seen the hecklers dancing together in At the Dance on my season one DVD collection LOL

it's actully quite funny because as a child I always thought strange pork was an old woman pig! hahaha

 

[minor muppetz]

it's actully quite funny because as a child I always thought strange pork was an old woman pig! hahaha

Even though Strangepork is bald?

While there weren't really any female monsters on The Muppet Show, there was a female monster, Fern, on The Jim Henson Hour. There was also a female monster, Aretha, who first appeared in a Fraggle Rock episode and then made a cameo in The Muppet Christmas carol and played one of the flying monkeys in The Muppets Wizard of Oz.