Best 59 quotes of Jim Henson on MyQuotes

Actually the copies of characters is something I don't particularly like to talk about in articles but just for your information, most characters there's only one.

A film is not done by one person. It's done by a lot of people. I love this whole collaborative aspect. When it works well, you end up with something better than any of us started out to do.

At the time of Polaroid - and I did a couple of other commercials just before I stopped doing that stuff - at that point I was at the level where they respect you and your opinion and all that sort of thing.

At the University of Maryland, my first year I started off planning to major in art because I was interested in theatre design, stage design or television design.

But with The Dark Crystal, instead of puppetry we're trying to go toward a sense of realism - toward a reality of creatures that are actually alive and we're mixing up puppetry and all kinds of other techniques.

Do everything at 100 percent of its potential and never accept second best.

Follow your enthusiasm. It's something I've always believed in. Find those parts of your life you enjoy the most. Do what you enjoy doing.

I believe that life is basically a process of growth-that we go through many lives, choosing those situations and problems that we will learn through.

I decided that what I really wanted to do was go off and paint.

I don't know exactly where ideas come from, but when I'm working well ideas just appear. I've heard other people say similar things - so it's one of the ways I know there's help and guidance out there. It's just a matter of our figuring out how to receive the ideas or information that are waiting to be heard.

I don't know exactly where ideas come from, it's just a matter of us figuring out how to receive the ideas waiting to be heard.

I don't resent working long hours. I shouldn't- I'm the one who set up my life this way. I love to work. It's the thing that I get the most satisfaction out of-nd probably what I do best. Not that I don't enjoy days off. I love vacations and loafing around. But I think much of the world has the wrong idea of working. It's one of the good things in life. The feeling of accomplishment is more real and satisfying than finishing a good meal- or looking at one's accumulated wealth.

I do remember doing shows strictly in black and white, too, so you're right.

If our 'message' is anything, it's a positive approach to life. That life is basically good. People are basically good.

If you're doing a large, complicated character with radio controls, it might take a number of people several months to make it and if you're talking about a quick little hand puppet, it could be made in 2 days, so there's enormous range there, and no real easy generalities.

If you take a character and you call him a frog, or like Rowlf, our dog, call him a dog, you immediately give the audience a handle.

I guess I was wrong when I said I never promised anyone. I promised me.

I know that I personally have felt quite happy because I've done what I wanted to do. I pursued my interests and have thus managed to combine my business with lots of fun. I guess my only advice is to do what you enjoy, and try to do your best with it.

It has always been difficult to get Big Bird to be very pretty. Big Bird in England is much more gorgeous.

It's a wonderful life and I love it.

It's into the same bag as E.T. and Yoda, wherein you're trying to create something that people will actually believe, but it's not so much a symbol of the thing, but you're trying to do the thing itself.

I've never felt any sense of competition with anybody, and we're all friends. We're all good friends.

I was very interested in theatre, mostly in stage design. I did a little bit of acting.

Life is meant to be fun, and joyous, and fulfilling.

(Lisa Henson about her father) He admired the job of the man who walks along the road picking up trash with a long stick. He thought that guy had a great job, walking along with a stick, enjoying the road, and doing only good in the world, with hundreds of small actions.

NBC was trying to convert all of their local programming to color right away to encourage the sale of the sets, so I barely remember working in black and white, although I do know that I did do it, but there was not a major difference, though.

Never eat anything at one sitting that you can't lift.

Nobody creates a fad. It just happens. People love going along with the idea of a beautiful pig. It’s like a conspiracy.

No, there's not much competition between puppeteers in general because everybody's working their own style.

Somebody like a Piggy or a Kermit, there needs to be several versions and so there will be several of them.

Television is basically teaching whether you want it to or not.

The beauty of nature has been one of the great inspirations in my life.

The most sophisticated people I've ever known had just one thing in common: they were all in touch with their inner children.

There was a little afternoon show that was called Afternoon. Back in those days in television, most local stations had a midday show for housewives that had a series of things. It was like a variety show for midday.

Watch out for the icy patch

Well, Detroit Institute is kind of a key - probably the largest permanent collection of puppets in the US.

We thought it would be fun to try to design a show that would work well internationally and so that' s what we're intending to do with Fraggle Rock, and we are indeed now selling it around the world.

When I was a kid, I never saw a puppet show. I never played with puppets or had any interest in them.

When The Muppet Show ended, we all sat around and said, what kind of television show would we like to do. We felt the need these days are for some quality children's programming.

Who said that every wish would be heard and answered when wished on an evening star? Somebody thought of it and someone believed it, and look what its done so far.

Yeah, I did some small parts in high school and the first year of college and then fairly soon thereafter I settled into the backstage scenery, and then at the University of Maryland I was doing posters for their productions.

Yeah, I think we did the term Muppets before we got the show Sam and Friends - a few months after I started working.

Yeah, well when I first started working, it was $5 a show; it was probably a little higher by the time I got to my own show, but I remember that they put me under contract at $100 a week, which to me was really an astronomical price.

Yeah, we pretty much had a form and a shape by that time - a style - and I think one of the advantages of not having any relationship to any other puppeteer was that it gave me a reason to put those together myself for the needs of television.

Yes, its one of the basic truths of the universe,....Things don't disappear. They just change, and change and change again.

You're assisting the audience to understand; you're giving them a bridge or an access. And if you don't give them that, if you keep it more abstract, it's almost more pure. It's a cooler thing.

Cara: *Flies* Gen: What? I don't have wings! Cara: Ofcourse not! You're a boy.

Here's some simple advice: Always be yourself. Never take yourself to seriously. And beware of advice from experts, pigs, and members of Parliament.

I don't want'a die... I have other plans!" -Fraggle Rock

If you can't beat them. Join them