Editing Jim Henson (section)

===Expansion of audience: 1970–1978===
[[File:Jim Henson (cropped).tif|thumb|upright|Henson in 1971]]
Henson, Oz, and his team were concerned that the company was becoming typecast solely as purveyors of children's entertainment, so they targeted an adult audience with a series of sketches on the first season of the late-night live television variety show ''[[Saturday Night Live]]''. Eleven ''[[The Land of Gorch|Land of Gorch]]'' sketches were aired between October 1975 and January 1976 on [[NBC]], with four additional appearances in March, April, May, and September 1976. Henson liked [[Lorne Michaels]]' work and wanted to be a part of it, but he ultimately concluded that "what we were trying to do and what his writers could write for it never gelled".<ref name="central"/> The ''SNL'' writers were not comfortable writing for the characters, and they frequently disparaged Henson's creations. [[Michael O'Donoghue]] quipped, "I won't write for felt."<ref>{{cite book |last=Shales |first=Tom |author-link=Tom Shales |author2=Miller, James Andrew |title =Live From New York: An Uncensored History of Saturday Night Live |publisher=[[Little, Brown and Company]] |year=2002 |location=[[Boston]] |pages=[https://archive.org/details/livefromnewyorku00shal/page/79 79–80] |isbn=0-316-78146-0 |url-access=registration |url=https://archive.org/details/livefromnewyorku00shal/page/79}}</ref>

Henson began developing a Broadway show and a weekly television series both featuring the Muppets.<ref name="central"/> The American networks rejected the series in 1976, believing that Muppets would appeal only to a child audience. Then, Henson pitched the show to British impresario [[Lew Grade]] to finance the show. The show would be shot in the United Kingdom and syndicated worldwide.<ref name="behindfrog">{{cite magazine |date=December 25, 1978 |title=The Man Behind the Frog |url=https://content.time.com/time/subscriber/article/0,33009,948401,00.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181010141141/http://content.time.com/time/subscriber/article/0,33009,948401,00.html |archive-date=October 10, 2018 |access-date=May 1, 2007 |magazine=Time}}</ref> That same year, he scrapped plans for his Broadway show and moved his creative team to England, where ''[[The Muppet Show]]'' began taping. The show featured Kermit as host, with a variety of prominent characters, notably [[Miss Piggy]], [[Gonzo (Muppet)|Gonzo the Great]], and [[Fozzie Bear]], in addition to its large cast of supporting characters such as the Muppet musicians [[Dr. Teeth and the Electric Mayhem]] with their chaotic drummer [[Animal (Muppet)|Animal]]. Henson's teammates sometimes compared his role to that of Kermit: a shy, gentle boss with "a whim of steel"<ref name="lifemag"/> who ran things like "an explosion in a mattress factory."<ref name="marvelous">{{cite magazine |last=Skow |first=John |url=https://content.time.com/time/subscriber/article/0,33009,948400,00.html |title=Those Marvelous Muppets |magazine=Time |date=December 25, 1978 |access-date=May 1, 2007 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071016182527/http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0%2C9171%2C948400%2C00.html |archive-date=October 16, 2007 }}</ref> [[Caroll Spinney]], who performed as Big Bird, remembered that Henson would never say he did not like something. "He would just go 'Hmm.'&nbsp;... And if he liked it, he would say, 'Lovely!'"<ref name="People Weekly Article"/> Henson recognized Kermit as an alter ego, though he thought that Kermit was bolder than he; he once said of the character: "He can say things I hold back."<ref name="newsweek">{{cite magazine |author1=Seligmann, J. |author2=Leonard, E. |title=Jim Henson: 1936–1990 |magazine=Newsweek |date=May 28, 1990}}</ref>
[[File:Jim Henson, creator, The Muppets -full.jpg|thumb|Henson with [[Miss Piggy]] and [[Fozzie Bear]] in 1979]]