On The Colbert Report last night, Frank Oz — who has provided the voice for Cookie Monster, Bert, Miss Piggy, among other Muppets — sat down with Stephen Colbert for a riveting question-and-answer session. It wasn’t an interview of softball questions, either: Stephen Colbert took off the gloves and demanded an answer to the hard-hitting question we’ve been waiting for someone to ask for years: Do Muppets have sex?
The answer, it turns out, is more complicated than a simple yes or no. Asked first if Animal has groupies, Colbert leaned in and subtly implied at what he was getting at.
“Muppet sex,” Colbert said, raising an eyebrow. Oz, uncomfortably murmured, “You actually said it.”
“I insinuated, and you extenuated,” Colbert came back. “You made me be explicit.”
Colbert then leaned in and asked more directly: “Do Muppets have sex?”
Oz, taken aback, gasped “What?!”
Eventually, however, Colbert wore him down, but Oz could offer only a half-assed answer to the question, “Where do Muppets come from?”:
I have performed with the Muppets for many years. And when I did, I didn’t make the characters. Many people who are tremendously talented at the workshop make the characters. I can’t tell you what actually happens there, but it’s all done in the workshop.
I think we know what goes on in that workshop. Let’s just say it involves a lot of fur and stuffing. Here’s the Kermit and Miss Piggy sex tape that confirms our worst fears.
My thoughts exactly, Beaker.
Watch the full interview, where Oz talks at length about Little Shop of Horrors and addresses the sexual orientation of Bert and Ernie.
