History Trivia / TheMuppetMovie

* InMemoriam: The movie is "dedicated to the memory and magic of Creator/EdgarBergen", who had died shortly after filming his cameo appearance in 1978, and who was a major influence on Jim's early work. Bergen, with his dummies Charlie [=McCarthy=] and Mortimer Snerd, also appeared as ''Series/TheMuppetShow'' guest stars prior to this film.

** Statler and Waldorf popping up at random points throughout the film to offer GreekChorus commentary.

** Statler and Waldorf popping up at random points throughout the film.

** An extra verse in both "Movin' Right Along" and "I Hope That Something Better Comes Along", both of which appear on the soundtrack album.

* AllStarCast: Between the Muppets themselves and all the cameos... Including, behind the scenes, Creator/TimBurton and Creator/JohnLandis, who were amongst the numerous people called in to operate the Muppets for the final number (Burton operated Sam the Eagle, Landis did Grover).

* AccidentallyCorrectWriting: Gonzo wants to go to Bombay (now Mumbai), India to become a movie star. As is noted on the main page, Bombay was then and is now the center of the Bollywood film industry, which produces more films per year than Hollywood...meaning that Gonzo was completely reasonable to pin his hopes there. However, Henson and crew chose Bombay as what (they thought) was [[RuleOfFunny the most far-flung, unlikely place]] to become an actor, not realizing how huge Bollywood really was until ''after'' release. This did get corrected and reused as a plot device in a later episode of ''The Muppet Show''.

* BreakawayPopHit: Kermit's performance of "Rainbow Connection" hit the ''Billboard'' Top 40 in 1979, ultimately peaking at #25. It was Jim Henson's second hit single "in character" following "[[Series/SesameStreet Rubber Duckie]]" nine years earlier.

* WhatCouldHaveBeen: [[WhatCouldHaveBeen/TheMuppets We have our own page here Yaaaaaaaaa]].

* WhatCouldHaveBeen: [[http://www.toughpigs.com/anthmovie01.htm Visit here for an analysis on a draft script]].
** One of the biggest one to note is the recurring appearance of '''Henry Kissinger''', whose entire schtick is that he's not cast in the film, not even for the Framing Device. HilariousInHindsight again?
** Creator/GeorgeBurns was scripted to play the co-owner of a bait shop by the swamp with Kermit, but it never happened.
** Henson wanted Doc Hopper to have a HeelFaceTurn at the end, but Creator/FrankOz disagreed, and won out.
** Max was initially a minor character. Austin Pendleton was offered the role, but initially turned it down, feeling the part was too small. The Max character was rewritten, and about a week later, James Frawley convinced Pendleton to appear in the movie.
** "Never Before, Never Again" was originally supposed to have been sung by Music/JohnnyMathis. After Mathis recorded the song, Jim Henson figured it would be much funnier if Miss Piggy sang it. But Mathis' version of the song wouldn't go to waste -- it was featured in the television special ''The Muppets Go Hollywood''.
** The rainbow during the iconic finale shot was originally to appear on-set during filming via a scrim sheet (as mentioned above, and evidenced by some behind the scenes and publicity photos of the scene). However, it was decided to remove it entirely and add the rainbow in post because they thought the scrim muted the colors of the Muppets too much.

* InMemoriam: The movie is "dedicated to the memory and magic of Creator/EdgarBergen", who had died shortly after filming his cameo appearance in 1978, and who was a major influence on Jim's early work. Bergen and his puppets also appeared as ''Series/TheMuppetShow'' guest stars prior to this film.

* YouLookFamiliar: Creator/CharlesDurning would appear in a later Muppet work ''Film/ElmoSavesChristmas'', playing the role of Santa. In a case of WhatCouldHaveBeen, he was also considered for the role of Mike Tarkanian in ''Film/TheGreatMuppetCaper'' before they settled with Creator/JackWarden.

* InMemoriam: The movie is "dedicated to the memory and magic of Creator/EdgarBergen", who'd died shortly after filming his cameo appearance in 1978, and who was a major influence on Jim's early work. Bergen and his puppets also appeared as ''Series/TheMuppetShow'' guest stars prior to this film.

* AllStarCast: Between the Muppets themselves and all the cameos... Including, behind the scenes, Creator/TimBurton and Creator/JohnLandis, who were amongst the numerous people called in to operate the Muppets for the final number.

* BreakawayPopHit: Kermit's performance of "Rainbow Connection" hit the ''Billboard'' Top 40 in 1979, ultimately peaking at #25.

* DirectToVideo: In Japan, the film was never shown in theaters and its first release was on laserdisc, with the dub voice cast the same as that of the 1981 Creator/TVAsahi broadcast of ''The Muppet Show''. The movie has since been re-released on [=Disney+=] with a new dub featuring the characters' official current voice actors.

* TalkingToHimself: One of the benefits of this and the other feature films was the opportunity it afforded for characters like Henson's Kermit and Rowlf, Oz's Piggy and Fozzie, etc., to interact in a way that wasn't always technically feasible on television.

* BreakawayPopHit: "Rainbow Connection" hit the ''Billboard'' Top 40 in 1979, ultimately peaking at #25.

* RealitySubtext: Creator/EdgarBergen and Charlie [=McCarthy=] made their last appearance in the film -- Henson was inspired to make the Muppets because of him. Bergen died not long after his scene was shot, and the film is dedicated to him.

* RealitySubtext: Edgar Bergen and Charlie [=McCarthy=] made their last appearance in the film -- Henson was inspired to make the Muppets because of him. Bergen died not long after his scene was shot, and the film is dedicated to him.

* InMemoriam: The movie is "dedicated to the memory and magic of Creator/EdgarBergen", who'd died shortly after filming his cameo appearance in 1978, and who was a major influence on Jim's early work. He and his puppets also appeared as ''Series/TheMuppetShow'' guest stars prior to this film.

* UnintentionalPeriodPiece: The “Have you tried Hare Krishna?” RunningGag was a lot funnier when the group was at the height of notoriety for their aggressive recruitment tactics, especially harassing people at airports. People these days may not even recognize the name.

** "Never Before, Never Again" was originally supposed to have been sung by Johnny Mathis. After Mathis recorded the song, Jim Henson figured it would be much funnier if Miss Piggy sang it. But Mathis' version of the song wouldn't go to waste -- it was featured in the television special ''The Muppets Go Hollywood''.

* AFIS100Years100Songs: #74, "Rainbow Connection"

* AccidentallyCorrectWriting: Gonzo wants to go to Bombay (now Mumbai), India to become a movie star. As is noted on the main page, Bombay was then and is now the center of the Bollywood film industry, which produces more films per year than Hollywood...meaning that Gonzo was completely reasonable to pin his hopes there. However, Henson and crew chose Bombay as what (they thought) was [[RuleOfFunny the most far-flung, unlikely place]] to become an actor, not realizing how huge Bollywood really was until ''after'' release.

** The film was produced by Creator/ITCEntertainment, and went through its' then-new American distribution firm, Associated Film Distribution. Its original UsefulNotes/{{home video|distributors}} release came from Magnetic Video in 1980. Due to Creator/TwentiethCenturyFox buying Magnetic Video and the reorganization of that unit, the next home release was from CBS/Fox Video. Then, in 1993, it was released by Jim Henson Video through Creator/{{Disney}}, then in 1999 by Columbia [=TriStar=] Home Video, who also handled the first DVD of the film in 2001, and finally, back to Disney in 2005, this time through their own label.

** Director James Frawley had no prior Muppet experience; Henson and co. hired him because he ''did'' have feature film experience and they were new to that particular medium, but it did mean that he was an outsider to the tight-knit group and this led to on-set disagreements and tension. Austin Pendleton, who as Max was one of only two actors around for a significant chunk of the shoot (the other being Charles Durning as Doc Hopper), [[http://www.avclub.com/article/austin-pendleton-31009 didn't find it a happy experience]] as a result (save for working with Durning).

*** People who weren't regular puppeteers feeling fatigue from keeping their arms up for so long.

* AccidentallyCorrectWriting: Gonzo wants to go to Bombay (now Mumbai), India to become a movie star. As is noted on the main page, Bombay was then and is now the center of the Bollywood film industry, which produces more movies per year than Hollywood...meaning that Gonzo was completely reasonable to pin his hopes there. However, Henson and crew chose Bombay as what (they thought) was [[RuleOfFunny the most far-flung, unlikely place]] to become an actor, not realizing how huge Bollywood really was until ''after'' the movie came out.

** Statler and Waldorf popping up at random points in the movie.

* LoopingLines: Sam's line to Kermit at the beginning of the film asking if it had any "Socially redeeming values" which was already pre-rerecorded due to Frank Oz being busy performing Piggy for the screening room scene, had to be redone after the scene was filmed due to an unplanned blooper of Sam getting a paper plane stuck in his wing, to which the ADR'd version added him reacting to it with a gasp.
* MethodActing: Jim Henson recorded his vocals for the soundtrack while operating Kermit. Both he and Paul Williams agreed that Jim couldn't properly get into character just singing on his own and Williams suggested that Jim bring Kermit into the recording studio so "he" would be singing and not Jim.
* RealitySubtext: Creator/EdgarBergen and Charlie [=McCarthy=] made their last appearance in the film -- Henson was inspired to make the Muppets because of him. Bergen died not long after his scene was shot, and the film is dedicated to him.

* TalkingToHimself: One of the benefits of this and the other feature films was the opportunity it afforded for characters like Jim Henson's Kermit and Rowlf, Frank Oz's Piggy and Fozzie, etc., to interact in a way that wasn't always technically feasible on television.

** One of the biggest one to note is the recurring appearance of '''Henry Kissinger''', whose entire schtick is that he's not cast in the movie, not even for the Framing Device. HilariousInHindsight again?

** Jim Henson wanted Doc Hopper to have a HeelFaceTurn at the end, but Creator/FrankOz disagreed, and won out.

** The rainbow during the iconic finale shot of the film was originally to appear on-set during filming via a scrim sheet (as mentioned above, and evidenced by some behind the scenes and publicity photos of the scene). However, it was decided to remove it entirely and add the rainbow in post because they thought the scrim muted the colors of the Muppets too much.
* YouLookFamiliar: Creator/CharlesDurning would appear in a later Muppet work ''Film/ElmoSavesChristmas'', playing the role of Santa. In a case of WhatCouldHaveBeen, he was also considered for the role of Mike Tarkanian in ''Film/TheGreatMuppetCaper'' before they settled with Jack Warden.