Meet the Feebles (1989)

Heidi, the vain, singing 400lb hippopotamus star of New Zealand’s beloved and top-rated TV show, the Meet The Feebles Variety Hour, discovers her lover, bleary-eyed producer Bletch the Walrus, is cheating on her – with a Siamese cat!

With very little time remaining before the show is to be broadcast, the assorted co-stars must contend with that situation and a number of other problems.

Host Harry the Hare is ravaged by a fatal sex disease (referred to only as “the big one”) contracted through his debauched rabbit-like sex life; Wynyard the Frog is a Vietnam vet and heroin addict who needs a fix before his nightly knife-throwing act – in which he usually misses at least once; the devious Trevor the Rat hisses like Peter Lorre and shoots S&M porno movies in the basement with Daisy the Cow and Wally the Cockroach (until she accidentally crushes him to death by sitting on his face); Sid the Elephant is the target of a paternity suit from a small white hen; Mr Big is a whale crime king who runs the underwaterworld, and the Fly is a scurrilous muck-raking journalist who spends most of his time munching on faeces at the bottom of a toilet bowl.

Some of the nicer characters include shy Robert (or “Wobbit”) the Hedgehog who has just been hired to appear in the chorus and is immediately smitten with a cute little poodle called Lucille; fey director Sebastian the Fox (who sings a big production number about the joys of sodomy), and benevolent chain-smoking Cockney stage manager, Arfur the Worm.

In the end, the jilted hippo goes bonkers and sets out on a Rambo-style rampage with an M60 machine gun, leaving the film awash with gore.

Meet The Feebles presented puppets as never seen before – including puppet sex, puppet vomit, puppet crime, puppet drug addiction, puppet porn, puppet betrayal and puppet murder.

Future Lord of The Rings director Peter Jackson received a very mixed critical reaction to Meet The Feebles, divided between excessive praise and sharp condemnation.

One thing is for sure – you’ll never look at The Muppet Show the same way again.

Heidi the Hippo
Danny Mulheron
Bletch the Walrus
Peter Vere-Jones
Samantha the Cat
Donna Akersten
Sebastian the Fox
Stuart Devenie
Dr Quack
Stuart Devenie
Daisy the Cow
Stuart Devenie
Sandy the Chicken
Stuart Devenie
Robert the Hedgehog
Mark Hadlow
Barry the Bulldog
Mark Hadlow
Wynyard the Frog
Brian Sergent
Trevor the Rat
Brian Sergent
The Fly
Brian Sergent
Arfur the Worm
Peter Vere-Jones
Sid the Elephant
Mark Wright
Louie the Fish
Mark Wright
Wally the Cockroach
Mark Wright
Sheep
Donna Akersten

Director
Peter Jackson

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