Puppets CANNOT ad-lib. (TS)

"For what doth it profit a puppet, if he should gain the whole world, and yet lose his own soul?"

It's Reggie's birthday party, and you're invited to watch him get crunk. 

Yes, naive and mildly retarded Reggie is having an unsupervised birthday party with his group of mostly Christian friends.  But Big John, the unbeliever clad in a beret and leather jacket, is all up in his business, claiming that this party is "soft" and "whack."  He convinces Reggie to break into his father's liquor cabinet so they can have some real fun (which may or may not include getting wasted and rolling around on the front lawn).

Reggie's father comes home, finds him drunk and exclaims, "You got into my liquor cabinet?!  You know that's only for cooking.  We don't drink that!"  Yes, it's like that.

The real reason to watch this piece, originally recorded off TBN some time in 2004, is that the actors voicing the puppets don't seem to be working from any real script.  It's as if they're just...improvising their way towards some sort of inevitable conclusion.  The finest example of this comes toward the end, when the father puppet lights up the screen with a tour de force performance.  As Bobby so aptly put it:

"There will be no seating during Dad's rambling tirade."

Enjoy.

Comments

[cardinalzen]

Wow.

Favs:

"When you put God's word in your heart and in your, uh, mouth, it comes out."

and, following the awkward pause after Reggies request for a gameboy..

"Well, we didn't maybe spend that much money on you but we did at least all get you something."

Love how the A and B camera operators just kind of guess as to who's going to speak next.

[Jif]

Hear, hear!

Raise a glass to 3CT's finest hour. I laughed so hard at this, I dribbled Pops cereal and milk onto my pants. Wow. And, heck, I've seen this before.

My favorite couplet from Dad's rant:

"I leave for twenty minutes..."
Then, later...
"Maybe it's my fault for leaving you alone for so long."

I'm going to go watch it again.

Cheers.

[Jif]

It's the awkward pauses that cause your mind to fill in the gaps.

Blonde puppet: "I ate so much popcorn, it's coming out my" (LONG PAUSE) "ears."

I also like Black Puppet who is not allowed to talk.

Dad likes saying "next time" and then putting it together with "ever again."

It's fun for me to, instead, think that the actors have performed it EXACTLY AS SCRIPTED. A first pass, sort of thing.

Man.

[Taran]

ok. I think I've recovered sufficiently to post a couple of comments. Wow..I actually wept as I watched this. Very well done guys.

**I love the length that Dad goes to explain the glaringly obvious "plot" hole that this kind of family wouldn't have a liquor cabinet around. Yes, some people do cook with liquor, but generally don't keep a cabinet full.

**The little boy puppet's speech was slurred before he drank a drop.

**Why does Big John (or Bad John, they changed his name in the final "scene") slouch menacingly after the boy as they head toward the cooking liquor cabinet??

**The father sounds like a kid playing a father.

**The father seems oddly regretful about his 30 minute absence. Like he stepped out during his son's birthday party to get his heroin fix or something.

**The puppet commode disturbs me. What other scenes would they use it for?

Great work!!!!

[bobby]

I see a lot of myself in Reggie. Mainly my hand.

[jenny]

I think the dad is the same puppet who plays The Count on Sesame Street. Quite a range.

Please say there are more of these TBN morality tales out there. Maybe about gambling, or premarital sex, or reading science fiction?

[Tim]

Big ups to Bobby for getting these clips up and online for 3CT.

All I really did was press "record" on the VCR one day.

I think that the first few times you watch this mess, it can be confusing. There is so much going wrong at once that I have a hard time processing it. Do I focus on Reggie's slurry three-year old voice, or his bug eyes, or the wandering, unsure quality of the dialogue?. It was almost too much for me the first time I saw it.

[Tim]

Jenny,

Yes, we do have more puppets. But I'm not sure we have more TBN puppets. Bobby has some good stuff saved and ready for the Internet, courtesy of Public Access. I'm not sure how close he is to that.

[Jif]

Bobby's comment is wonderful.

[Jif]

Maybe there's another TBN one advising against buying meth from gay masseuses.

[Tim]

The senior pastor comes back to the church office and regrets that he left the associate pastor alone for half an hour. Then reminds him that they only keep a gay masseuse in the church for cooking.

[Taran]

Wow..Jif. Cold and timely.

[Tim]

Someone really needs to post something new.

[bobby]

I know, right?