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Research dossier · Arts & Letters

The Muppet Movie

1979 film by James Frawley

Manuscripts, fine bindings, an engraving plate and preserved performance ephemera
Arts and lettersInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionSep 22, 2026
Entity authoritySource title only
Source-derived summary

The Muppet Movie is a 1979 musical road comedy film, directed by James Frawley and produced by Jim Henson, and the first theatrical film to feature the Muppets. A co-production between the United Kingdom and the United States, the film was written by The Muppet Show writers Jerry Juhl and Jack Burns. Produced during the third season of The Muppet Show, the film tells the origin story of the Muppets, as Kermit the Frog embarks on a cross-country trip to Los Angeles, encountering several of the Muppets—who all share the same ambition of finding success in professional show business—along the way while being pursued by Doc Hopper, a greedy restaurateur with intentions of recruiting Kermit to promote his frog legs business.

Editorial summary

This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “The Muppet Movie” as 1979 film by James Frawley. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.

Editorial reviewA useful identification and reception guide that helps separate the work itself from editions, performances, ownership and later interpretation. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1979—that can be checked directly. The selected authority fields contribute no independent date. The account is most persuasive where Muppet, Movie and film can be independently traced.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The subject matters to the arts & letters register because the source frames it as 1979 film by James Frawley. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.

Evidence profile

Attribution, date and provenance are strongest when supported by the original work, a catalogue record and documented transmission. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 22, 2026. The first chronological checks are 1979.

Critical limits

Titles can refer to several editions, objects or performances, making precise identification essential before interpretation. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Separate the work, its editions or performances, and its later reception. Catalogue records, publication histories and object files often preserve different parts of that story.

Best used for
  • Identifying works and editions
  • Tracing reception history
  • Finding collection records
Verify next

The original object or edition, catalogue raisonné, performance record, rights file and holding institution.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “The Muppet Movie”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow The Muppet Movie primary sources, The Muppet Movie archive and Muppet research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “The Muppet Movie”?
  2. How did later circulation or interpretation alter the work’s reception?
  3. Which edition, object, performance or recording is being described?
Subject index

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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “The Muppet Movie” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.