Follow That Bird (1985) on Netflix
G19851h 28mAdventureComedyFamily
Miss Finch, a social worker, sends Big Bird from Sesame Street to live with a dodo family in Oceanview, Illinois. Big Bird is unhappy among the Dodos, who think little of non-birds.
- Netflix3.4/5
- IMDb6.8/106,168 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes92%
Trailer
Plot summary
The Feathered Friends' Board of Birds finds homes for stray birds, and it takes up the case of Big Bird. Miss Finch, a strict social worker, travels to New York City and brings Big Bird from Sesame Street to a family of dodos in Oceanview, Illinois. The Dodos think poorly of anyone who is not a bird, and they insist that his best friend should be a bird rather than Mr. Snuffleupagus, who stays behind on Sesame Street to watch his nest.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Follow That Bird (1985)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- While filming Bert and Ernie's "upside down world" song, puppeteers Jim Henson and Frank Oz were actually inside an upside-down biplane eighteen feet from the ground.
- After the crew finished shooting Big Bird's farm scenes with Ruthie and Floyd, they found the film badly scratched and unusable. Everyone had to return to the same location months later in winter, spray-painting leaves green, and between takes the kids would run to put their coats on.
- Because of his criminal record, Northern Calloway was banned from entering Canada, which led the writers to remove his character, David, from the script.
- Actress Cheryl Wagner played and voiced Miss Finch during the shoot, but after filming wrapped the filmmakers decided her voice was not right for the character and dubbed the entire role over with Sally Kellerman, which turned out to be Kellerman's only Muppet film before her 2022 death.
- This is the only Sesame Street feature film to star both Jim Henson and Richard Hunt together, and it turned out to be the last Muppet movie either of them made before Henson died in 1990 and Hunt in 1992.
