Sesame Seeds (Episode 13): Abby Cadabby

 

Hi everyone, and welcome back to Sesame Seeds, the series where we look at the progression of a Sesame Street character from humble beginnings to the present day.

Today, we’re looking at someone much newer than everyone in this series so far, but has been around long enough to qualify, Abby Cadabby. (Which, yes, is a play on the word, Abracadabra.)

Abby is a four year old fairy-in-training, who's still learning about how to properly do magic. What’s her story? Let’s poof our way into this and find out.

So, the year was 2006, and Elmo-mania was still in effect. Meanwhile, Sesame Workshop was planning to release a new character that would hopefully reach the same popularity level Elmo was at. They wanted this character to be a major female player that would hopefully click with the girls watching at home. They also wanted this character to be from a different culture, but not an actual human one. So after much brainstorming, they came up with the idea of a pink fairy character from the world of fairy tales.

And once Ed Christie designed her and Rollie Krewson built her, Abby was brought into the world. As many of you might notice, she looks rather different than her other muppet co-stars, and that was intentional, because she wasn’t from where they were, and the other fairies in her original home look similar to her.

All she needed now was a voice, and they found one for her in the great and talented Leslie Carrara-Rudolph, who settled into her new character exceptionally well. Probably because Miss Rudolph already had an affinity for fairies, and had experience playing one with Ginger from Johnny and the Sprites.

Before her debut on the show, she made a public appearance on the Today Show, letting the people know who she was, and where she was heading.

At the time, Abby was very young and inexperienced. The only things she knew how to do were teleporting and turning things into pumpkins, and she also had a habit of floating in the air when she was really excited about something. Another important thing about Abby is that she’s the daughter of Cinderella’s fairy godmother, giving her a connection to many of the other popular fairy tale characters that would often appear on the show.

Abby made her actual first appearance in episode 4109, the first episode of the 37th season, where she introduced herself as a young fairy who just moved to the street, throughout the episode, she got a “formal” greeting from Oscar, an opportunity to play hide-and-seek with Big Bird, Snuffy, Elmo and Zoe, learned how to count to 10 with help from the Count and got her wand fixed by Maria and Luis at the Fix-It Shop. (After turning a toaster into a pumpkin.)

In her next few episodes, we would see Abby attending Storybook Community School, learning about imagination, learning how to ride a tricycle, having her first sleepover, and interacting with most of the established cast. A certain red member among them being the one she interacted with the most.

You see, because of Elmo’s popularity, the crew realized Abby’s popularity would increase if she was paired up with him, so throughout her time on the show, he was the character she interacted with the most. And they soon became best friends, and the two characters that kids responded the most to. I have no data to support this claim, but I’m pretty sure when you ask a 2 or 3 year old who their favorite character is, they’d probably say Elmo, Abby, or both.

For the next few seasons, whenever Abby was featured in an episode, she would try to solve a problem the other characters were experiencing with her magic, but would always end up failing with humorous results, such as:

• Trying to make Baby Bear not scared of bees, but turning him and Chris into bees instead.

• Trying to make it winter, so Elmo can ride his sled, but messing up the seasonal timeline.

• Attempting to make Elmo grow a little taller, but instead making him gargantuan.

• Getting rid of gravity to give Big Bird and Snuffy the experience of floating, but affecting everyone else in the process.

• Trying to help Leela get ready for a party, and along the way, turning Chris into a horse.

• Using her mom’s magic wand to bring nature stuff to Hooper’s and bringing a jungle complete with animals.

• Giving Big Bird physical features that weren’t his own. (Though to be fair, she didn’t enjoy doing it.)

• And attempting to send Big Bird to California to see his cousin, but ending up sending Chris to Antarctica.

Those are just the examples off the top of my head. But there are plenty more.

With her endearing personality and outstanding performance by Miss Rudolph, Abby soared to popularity almost as fast as Elmo did.

Not only would she get her own selection of merchandise, and 43 foot balloon of her likeness in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, but she would also get her own CGI animated segment starting in season 40, known as Abby’s Flying Fairy School.

Then in 2012, she would play a big role in a subject the show wanted to tackle, but had previously failed at: Divorce.

Now if you remember my episode on Snuffy, you’ll know that they had tried to make a divorce show involving Snuffy and his family, but kids didn’t respond well to it, so it never saw the light of day, but the crew had decided to try again, this time focusing on Abby and her family.

In the show, Abby usually only mentioned her mom whenever parental concerns were addressed, and in the video Little Children, Big Challenges, we find out that part of it is because Abby’s parents are divorced. But unlike their previous attempt, Abby shared details about what happened after the divorce, like talking to her parents about the changes that would be happening, getting reassurance from Gordon that nothing in this situation was her fault, and how she now has two homes.

When the series moved to HBO, Abby had the great honor of maintaining the revamped community garden, where she would get to learn more about and grow different plants, both regular and magical. She also got a change in wardrobe, as she began wearing a blue t-shirt and a purple skirt.

This would also be the time where not only would we get to Abby’s mom as an actual muppet character, played by Jenifer Barnhart, but Abby would also receive a new stepdad and stepbrother.

Freddy (Played by David Rudman) and his son Rudy (Played by Frankie Cordero) came into the series in season 47, and soon they were both rooted into both the Cadabby and Sesame Street families.

Then in season 49, she got her own segment called Abby’s Amazing Adventures, where she and Rudy would take on different tasks with the help of their magical basket friend.

And to this day, like many of her fellow muppets, Abby is still appearing in new Sesame material, still as magical as ever.

Now, unlike many kids today, I was around before and when Abby was introduced, so I’ve experienced her whole journey. If you were to take one look at her, you might just see her as Sesame Workshop’s way of pandering to little girls, (I’d be lying if I didn’t have that thought in the back of my head when I first saw her.) and it would have been very easy, if that was the case, but it’s not.

The fact of the matter is Abby is a well-rounded character, with a personality and flaws, that anyone can enjoy, just like the rest of the cast. Most of the credit for that should go to her performer. Miss Rudolph is a beacon of positivity, hilarity and creativity, and it’s obvious that she put a lot of herself into Abby.

Another great thing about Abby is that even though she’s a magical fairy, she’s not a Mary Sue. She doesn’t always know what she’s doing, she often makes mistakes, and she often needs help from her friends with stuff she doesn’t understand, which helps make her more relatable to the kids watching at home.

And speaking of her friends, Abby has proven multiple times she’s capable of holding her own funny and memorable interactions with her crewmates. Whether it be Elmo, Rudy, Cookie Monster, Oscar, Telly, Big Bird, or anyone else. Abby manages to play off of them extremely well.

But most of all, Abby is just so darn likable. She’s fun, curious, energetic and loyal to boot. A perfect addition to a street filled with colorful monsters, birds, grouches and snuffleupaguses. For 17 years and counting, Abby’s brought magic to this wonderful street, and I couldn’t be more grateful for her.

Well, that brings us to the end of another episode. So… Twinkle Out!