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Big Bird is going to be sad about this one! Earlier this month at Florida Supercon, longtime Sesame Street cast member Bob McGrath revealed that he had been let go from the show. He was involved with the show since it began in 1969.
Like many streets in America, Sesame Street has been going through a lot of changes recently. In 2015, HBO made a 5-year deal with non-profit network PBS that would allow them to air new episodes 9 months before they would be seen on PBS. The show was also reduced from an hour to 30 minutes so that they could produce more episodes per season. In January of this year, HBO began airing the new episodes and the classic Sesame Street catalogue went live on HBO Kids (which you have if you have HBO Go or HBO Now).
The 84 year-old McGrath, who went by “Bob” on the show and famously sang the Sesame Street classic “People In Your Neighborhood,” said that his fellow castmates Emilio Delgado (“Luis”) and Roscoe Orman (“Gordon”) were also let go by HBO. However, Alan Muraoka and Chris Knowings, cast members since 1998 and 2007 respectively, will continue to appear on the program.
It will be interesting to see if HBO decides to replace the original cast with new actors in upcoming episodes. Poor Elmo will have a lot of readjusting to do.
