My Life as a Furry Red Monster - Kevin Clash [49]
The Captain Kangaroo producers even came down to Turner’s Station, right into my house and into my parents’ bedroom, where they went to the yellow shelves and picked a few of my own characters who would appear on the show. They especially liked a dog called Francine Fuzzy, a silver-haired kid named Artie, and an anteater creature with a snout only a mother could love. The puppets I’d made at my kitchen table, with their Jo-Ann Fabrics fur and fleece, were going to be on national television, with their own story lines and supporting characters!
By the time I graduated from Dundalk High in 1979, I was doing regular guest spots on Captain Kangaroo and hoping to get on Sesame Street. Things were happening so quickly that I never considered stopping my work to go on to college, and my parents certainly didn’t press that issue. I had a shot at making my passion into my career, and they were behind me all the way. (Funny enough, I sometimes appeared as “Kevin the College Student” on Captain Kangaroo.)
I almost had the rug pulled out from under me, though, that summer after graduation. While all my classmates were making plans—college, the army, a job, a move—I was convinced that Sesame Street was going to come calling. The local papers even ran a story on how I was headed for show biz, that soon I’d be hanging with the likes of Big Bird and Ernie.
Thanks to Kermit Love, I had been able to get into the Sesame Street studios when I was in New York, where I would absorb what I could. I just knew that someone would notice me and give me my big break. I had actually auditioned for Jim Henson after I did the Macy’s parade, but Kermit had reminded Jim I had a commitment to Caboose so that hadn’t gone anywhere.
Now, after graduating, I had about as much common sense as one of my puppets when I boldly turned down a full-time job with Captain Kangaroo and quit Caboose, convinced that there was a job (and a rent-controlled brownstone apartment) waiting for me on Sesame Street. But they weren’t knocking down my door with an offer. Meanwhile, Caboose hired someone else to take my place—a gifted ventriloquist named Todd Stockman—and that train, so to speak, left the station without me. I’d said no to the Captain. So now I had no stage and no audience. Fate wasn’t cooperating with me.
Miraculously, the Captain came calling once more at the end of that summer, the job offer still in hand. This time I said yes, and I made the move to New York for good. Because I was full time, I no longer got free lodging courtesy of the show at the Holiday Inn. Since it was convenient for me to be near the CBS studios where we taped, I found a room at the George Washington Hotel, a cheap residential hotel on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. They must have offered a honeymoon suite (or an hourly rate) because nearly every night as I tried to get comfortable on the sagging excuse for a mattress, I was treated to the sounds of amorous athletics taking place on the opposite side of the wall, just inches from my head.
Finally, I had arrived in New York to stay. True, my cramped bunk on New Pittsburgh Avenue was heaven compared to this sorry lump of a bed, and I could have used some earplugs, but I was where I wanted to be, doing what I loved.
I WAS HAVING a blast on Captain Kangaroo, puppeteering and building puppets. (I also did some acting, but I was always more comfortable in front of the camera when I had a puppet on my arm.) Whenever I could, I continued to haunt the Sesame Street