Rex Robbins

Family

Long before America came to appreciate the talents of Jim Henson and his brilliant creations, The Muppets, Ed Sullivan had the foresight to identify with Henson's enormous creativity and provide him an opportunity to introduce his unique characters to the American public. With Henson's first appearance on September 18, 1966, The Muppets began to capture America's imagination, breaking down our old conceptions of what could be done with puppetry, challenging us to embrace these creatures as living and thinking beings. Not only does this program introduce us to Kermit, we can also see the beginnings of other Henson characters we've come to know and love, including reindeer discussing Christmas deliveries, singing cows, a monster engulfing a computer, and Kermit swallowing a worm. The charm and warmth that captured children and adults when these inventive segments first aired are just as powerful and compelling today. As you will see... The Muppets' charm and lore are timeless!

Drama · TV Movie

A young woman, unable to handle the stress of raising a family, runs out on her husband and young daughter. 12 years later, she returns in hopes of rekindling a bond with them.

Romance · Comedy

She's Kathy, a comix cartoonist; he's David, teaching English to new immigrants. It's New York City, with 29 shopping days left until Christmas, and they're in love. Or are they? Their romance has been on-again, off-again because David can't bring himself to say, "I love you." He can say it in French, Russian, Japanese, Chinese, but not English. So, when she learns at an inopportune time that he's applied for a job in Ho Chi Minh City, she asks for breathing room until Christmas; the film chronicles the ensuing days of restless indecision.

Animation

When Winnie, who never reads, lifts off with a foxy stranger, sensible Harriet must use every ounce of energy and brain power to rescue her.

Family · Animation

Big Anthony, left alone with Strega Nona's magic pasta pot, runs into trouble when he decides to show the townspeople how it works.

Animation

Based on the book by Roger Duvoisin and Louise Fatio. A lion in a Paris zoo tries to return his friends' visits by venturing into town to see him.

Animation

Irrepressible Max wants to stay up late on Christmas so he can see Santa Claus.

War

A Confederate soldier (Pat Hingle) tells boys to kill a man (Edward Herrmann), whose ghost comes back. Mark Twain tale of cowardly Confederate soldiers.

Animation

Henrika, a cow who longs to see the city, gets her wish - and- more when she rides an old raft down one of Holland's most picturesque canals - to adventure.

Documentary · Drama

Docudrama about the debate surrounding New York State's ratification of the United States Constitution. Historical figures wear modern dress and use familiar language to help today's audience understand firsthand the forces that shaped this country two hundred years ago. The argument, characters, passions and debating points are historically accurate, but the language and the medium of the debate is modern in form. Present day newscasters and commentators play themselves, reporting on the events of the 1780s as though they were occurring now.

Mrs. Holroyd is married to a loutish miner, who drinks, patronizes prostitutes, and apparently brutalizes her. When a gentlemanly neighbor makes romantic advances to her, she wishes her husband dead. Sooner than she hoped, her wish comes true—when her husband dies in a mining accident. When Charles Holroyd's body is brought home from the mine, and his wife and mother must wash him and lay him out for his funeral, we see for the first time the other side of the relationship between Mr. and Mrs. Holroyd—now, when it's too late.

A wicked troll tries in vain to gobble up a family of goats when they go trip-trapping over his bridge.

Stone Soup is an animated version of the classic 1947 children's book, "Stone Soup: An Old Tale" by Marcia Brown. The book is based on a French folktale, and the description for it reads thus, "Three soldiers came marching down the road towards a French village. The peasants, seeing them coming, suddenly became very busy, for soldiers are often hungry. So all the food was hidden under mattresses or in barns. There followed a battle of wits, with the soldiers equal to the occasion. Stone soup? Why, of course, they could make a wonderful soup of stones...but, of course, one must add a carrot or two...some meat...so it went."

Family

The arrival of the Pilgrims in the New World is chronicled in this dramatic reenactment of their daily activities during those first trying years in the colony they called Plimoth.