Search icon

Movies & TV

18th Sep 2018

Sesame Street release statement denying that Bert and Ernie are gay

Carl Kinsella

Sesame Street

“They remain puppets.”

Sesame Workshop, the nonprofit educational organisation behind beloved children’s television programme Sesame Street, has released a statement clarifying that Bert and Ernie are not gay.

The statement followed revelations by Sesame Street writer Mark Saltzman that Bert and Ernie were based on his own same-sex relationship.

“That’s what I had in my life, a Bert & Ernie relationship. How could it not permeate?,” Saltzman said. “The things that would tick off Arnie would be the things that would tick off Bert. How could it not? I will say that I would never have said to the head writer, “oh, I’m writing this, this is my partner and me.” But those two, Snuffalupagus, because he’s the sort of clinically depressed Muppet… you had characters that appealed to a gay audience. And Snuffy, this depressed person nobody can see, that’s sort of Kafka! It’s sort of gay closeted too.”

Sesame Workshop has since sought to clarify the situation. In a statement posted on Twitter, the workshop has said: “As we have always said, Bert and Ernie are best friends. They were created to teach preschoolers that people can be good friends with those who are very different from themselves.

“Even though they are identified as male characters and possess many human traits and characteristic (as most Sesame Street Muppets do) they remain puppets, and do not have a sexual orientation.”

However, this raises further questions. For example, Kermit is a Muppet and he has entered into a relationship with Miss Piggy.

Maybe there are different rules for Muppets than there are for regular puppets.

LISTEN: You Must Be Jokin’ with Conor Sketches | Tiger Woods loves Ger Loughnane and cosplaying as Charles LeClerc 

Topics:

Sesame Street