New home. Some format changes. Same monsters.
“Sesame Street” launches its 56th season on Nov. 10 with NASCAR champion Bubba Wallace as a guest, a slightly tweaked format and a new way to watch — via Netflix.
“There you are, hi,” Elmo invites viewers at the top of the show. “Elmo so happy to see you.”
The popular children’s staple will be offering an 11-minute main story at the top — up from 9 minutes last year — and a few new segments mixed with favorite returning ones.
“In the history of ‘Sesame Street,’ we’ve always reinvented in some sort of way over our last 56 years,” says Sal Perez, the executive producer. “We’re always looking for ways to modernize — have the look and feel of the show feel really engaging for kids today.”
The 11-minute main story in the first episode involves Elmo, Abby and Zoe having three kinds of races in the neighborhood, joined by an alarming amount of puppet chickens and Wallace offering sideline commentary.
First up is a sprint with a chicken on each of their backs — “poultry in motion,” Wallace offers — then a race with a chicken on a spoon and, last, a sack race with chickens also in the sack. Elmo gets discouraged when he doesn’t win initially but soon realizes that he didn’t have lunch so is low on fuel, the lesson of the day.
“I just love when we get to bring celebrities to ‘Sesame Street’ because they bring their own flavor, they bring their own point of view and experience. And so much of that Elmo racing episode was just heightened by Bubba being there,” says head writer Halcyon Person. (Miley Cyrus is also an upcoming guest.)
Person says expanding the main story even by a few minutes gives her and her team more runway to add elements she thinks connects with kids.
“That extra two minutes may not seem like much for our audience, but it allows us to have a song in every episode which we know our audience loves,” says Person, whose credits include “Dee & Friends in Oz” and “Karma’s World.”
“We get to have even more animation, even more comedy, more time for physical humor. We know when kids are laughing, they’re learning. So, we just love when we can get them laughing so that our salient messaging can come through loud and clear, too.”
Netflix and the fourth wall
The deal with Netflix is a game-changer for “Sesame Street” since the streamer gives it a worldwide reach — the new season will be streamed in 30 languages — while keeping it on its long-standing home, PBS Kids and the PBS Kids Video app, at the same time. Episodes will be available on both Netflix and PBS on the same day.
