Written by GeekGirlCon Board President Jennifer Stuller. Cross-posted with permission from the author from her blog.
One of my most treasured GeekGirlCon memories involves puppets. Okay, several of my favorite GeekGirlCon experiences involve puppets (looking at you, Puppet Joss Whedon – you handsy bastard), but this one in particular involves the spectacular Red Fraggle and her handler, the extraordinarily talented & singularly kind Karen Prell.
Karen had attended our inaugural con in 2011 for a sing-along screening of Labyrinth at the EMP. We’d held a sock-puppet making workshop earlier in the day, led by our Design Team, and she pointed out some key moments for puppet participation. (Seeing happy geek women & girls singing and smiling and waving sock puppets they made themselves packing the JBL theater was SQUEE.)
In 2013, celebrations for the 30th Anniversary of Fraggle Rock were taking place, and GeekGirlCon was presented with an opportunity to get in on the joy. The Jim Henson Company agreed to loan us Red – but she needed to be flown out with a handler and put up in a hotel. Red was certainly not a diva, and the expense was less than I’d predicted, but more than our entire programming budget.
The Executive Director and I decided it was something too special to not make happen.
Did you know it is the 30th anniversary of Fraggle Rock? We know you remember rockin’ out and dancing your cares away! GeekGirlCon ‘13 is excited to be involved with the celebration!
We welcome back the phenomenally entertaining and talented Karen Prell (remember her from GeekGirlCon ‘11 and the Labyrinth Sing-A-Long?) along with her very special friend direct from The Jim Henson Company, Red Fraggle!
“We’re excited to meet Red and Karen when they take the stage together at GeekGirlCon ’13!” says Director of Programming and Events, Jennifer K. Stuller. Prell is as excited as we are. She said, “Performing Red in my hometown in front of a bunch of girl geeks? That’ll be amazing!”
We think so too!
Red Fraggle
Red Fraggle is as active, energetic, and competitive as the color red itself denotes. According to the Jim Henson Company, “Red Fraggle is a nonstop whirligig of activity. To her fellow Fraggles, Red is often seen as a flash of crimson racing to her next athletic pursuit. She is Fraggle Rock champion in Tug-of-War, Diving while Singing Backwards, the Blindfolded One-Legged Radish Relay, and a number of other traditional Fraggle sports. She is outgoing, enthusiastic, and athletic, but take note – her impetuosity can get her into real trouble.”
Karen Prell embarked on her first career as a puppeteer with Jim Henson and the Muppets in 1980 and performed popular film and television puppet characters for 16 years. Her most well known characters are fan favorites Red Fraggle in Fraggle Rock and the Worm in Labyrinth. Her puppet credits also include Sesame Street, The Muppet Show, and several classic and recent Muppet movies. Her second career as a computer animator included work on the award-winning Pixar films Geri’s Game, For the Birds, A Bug’s Life, and Toy Story 2 and Disney’s Enchanted through Tippett Studio.
Karen is now well into a third career in video games at Valve, animating characters as well as tackling game testing, merchandise design and development. She was the main animator for Wheatley the mechanical companion sphere in Portal 2 and also contributed to animation for GLaDOS and the co-op bots Atlas and P-body. She is currently animating a wide variety of creatures for DotA 2. Karen’s career has come full circle and she continues to celebrate 30 years of Fraggle Rock.
