In today's world, you might correctly assume that some people are untouchable. That no matter what they do or say, they simply cannot be removed from their position of power. Trump. Putin. The guy who does Kermit the Frog's voice.
Unfortunately it seems that the latter in that unholy trinity is not as invincible as you may have thought, as the voice of Kermit, the most famous of all the Muppets, has been fired.
Steve Whitmire, who has been voicing the world's best-known frog since 1990 - when creator Jim Henson and the original voice of Kermit died - said that he was 'devastated to have failed' Henson and that the decision was not his.
“For me the Muppets are not just a job, or a career, or even a passion," he wrote in an emotional blog on his website. They are a calling, an urgent, undeniable, impossible to resist way of life. This is my life’s work since I was 19 years old. I feel that I am at the top of my game, and I want all of you who love the Muppets to know that I would never consider abandoning Kermit.”
He said that he was informed in October 2016 that Kermit was being re-cast, but "remained silent the last nine months in hopes that the Disney company might reverse their course."
The whole thing seems a bit sketchy as neither Whitmire nor Disney have given a reason for his departure, although Whitmire claimed to have offered 'multiple remedies' to whatever the problem was.
In any case, excuse us while we go sob in a corner and mourn a piece of our childhood.
