Big Bird Performer Caroll Spinney Leaving Sesame Street After 50 Years

Oct. 17, 2018, 3:02 p.m.

For almost 50 years, Caroll Spinney has been the man inside the Big Bird costume (he's also played Oscar the Grouch, since he's no slouch).

101718bigbird1.jpg

For almost 50 years, Caroll Spinney has been the man inside the Big Bird costume (he's also played Oscar the Grouch, since he's no slouch) on the greatest children's television program in history, Sesame Street. Other actors and puppeteers have come and gone since the show started in 1969, but Spinney has never left his Muppet home. That all changes soon though: Spinney announced today that he would be retiring from Sesame Street to coincide with the show's 50th anniversary.

"I always thought, How fortunate for me that I got to play the two best Muppets?" the 84-year-old Spinney told the Times in a piece announcing his retirement. "Playing Big Bird is one of the most joyous things of my life." Spinney, who has appeared in thousands of episodes of the show, said that the physical requirements of performing the characters had been become difficult for him recently. As a result, he stopped doing the puppeteering for Big Bird in 2015 and has since been providing only the voices for him and Oscar. His final voice recordings will be used next year.

The whole interview is very sweet, filled with photos of Spinney and his life at Sesame Street (there is also a drawing, see below, that could make a grown person cry). He says at one point, "I’ve been playing a 6-year-old for 50 years," and "I don’t get to play [Big Bird] — I get to live his life." He also mentions that he was originally asked to play Big Bird as "a funny, dumb country yokel." After a few episodes, he made a suggestion: "I said, I think I should play him like he’s a child, a surrogate. He can be all the things that children are. He can learn with the kids."

We highly recommend you check out the 2014 documentary I Am Big Bird: The Caroll Spinney Story. There was also this sweet Reddit AMA he did in connection with the film, in which he reflected on talking to children about death. We also recommend you check out this AV Club article about the landmark "Farewell, Mr. Hooper" episode, in which Big Bird comes to accept Mr. Hooper’s death.