This month, Elmo tries to educate the toy trade, Lego recreates the world at London’s Southbank, the Power Rangers meet Michelle Obama and Bigjigs is celebrating entering the record books...
TOYTALK
What a bunch of Muppets…
mints on the table]. You could make that a toy. Grover: I think that kind of advice might put the toy industry out of business. Elmo: Next question! [laughs]
IT SEEMED like a good idea at the time. ToyNews’ Dominic Sacco would head into London to chat with Sesame Street’s pre-school monsters Elmo and Grover, and their fairy friend Abby Cadabby, for a natter. But we thought we’d also ask them for their solutions to the toy trade’s big ongoing issues, like beating counterfeit toys. Here’s a snippet of the chat below. What could possibly go wrong?
ToyNews: As we’re a business publication in the toy industry- Elmo: [Interrupting] Business? We don’t know anything about business.
The team and I at ToyNews think you’re good at teaching kids, so maybe you could teach the toy industry something? So, first of all. Counterfeit toys- Elmo: Counterfeit?
Fake toys. How would you stop fake toys? What do you do with them? Elmo: There’s no such thing as a fake toy. A toy is a toy is a toy. That’s the way Elmo feels. That’s very non- business of Elmo. Grover: It does not even need to be a toy to be able to play with it. It can be a toy if it isn’t a toy. Elmo: You can make it a toy. Like that candy for instance [points to a plate of
SEPTEMBER 2012
What would your favourite toys be? Elmo: Favourite toys…? The ones that are made... [Pause] Grover:… by the toy industry! [Laughter] Did that make up for the last question? Sorry! Elmo: [Turns to publicist] You listening to this? Are you listening to where we’re going with this? Publicist: I heard every word. Elmo: And you’re going to get us in trouble, aren’t you? [laughs]
The toy industry is very competitive. And sometimes some toy companies take other toy companies to court if- Elmo: [Interrupting] You know we’re looking at you blindly. Abby Cadabby: These sound like major adult things. Grover: Is he speaking English? Elmo: It’s Swahili. It sounds like Swahili. What we can tell you is that we love toys. [Leans towards ToyNews’ dictaphone] Recorder, that’s all we’re gonna say about toys, okay?
Considering you guys are in England right now, what would you do if you were king for a day? Abby Cadabby:Well I’d be shocked cos I’m supposed to be a queen. I don’t have the plumbing to be king, is what I’d say. Grover: [Laughs hysterically] Elmo: If Elmo was king for a day, Elmo would let everybody off work, and we’d all go out for the whole day.
That’s the best suggestion we’ve
heard. Sadly we have the rest of ToyTalk to write. You can listen to the full interview in audio form at www.youtube.com/ToyNewsOnline
On top of the (Lego) world
BIG BEN, the Eiffel Tower and the Leaning Tower of Pisa have been recreated in Lego and shown off at London’s Southbank Centre. During the Olympics period, tourists and locals used over one million Lego bricks, 4,000 building plates and 4,800 Lego Duplo bricks to recreate a map of the world, as
part of the Festival of the World celebrations. The structure – made up of 21
different Lego brick colours – measured 12 metres long and five metres wide. It was even designed by the UK’s certified Lego professional Duncan Titmarsh. If only we could be that cool.
Starspotting Send us your celebrity pics
Michelle Obama met up with the Power Rangers during a recent event at the US Ambassador’s residence in London. America’s First Lady was at a Let’s Move event for 1,000 American military children and US and British students to engage them in the spirit of the Olympic Games. The colourful characters also met David Beckham and Peter Schmeichel at the event. Meanwhile, here’s Zak’s business development manager Jeff Norman pictured with his daughter Charlotte and singer/songwriter Gordon Haskell (inset). The snap was taken on the Greek island of Skopelos in June. And don’t worry, we had to Google Haskell too…