Brian Henson

Brian, the son of Jim Henson, grew up with his parents who had created The Muppets, Playing with puppets alongside his brother and three sisters was natural to him. By the time he was 17, he had enough skill as a puppeteer to perform with his father in The Great Muppet Caper, but he didn't think the muppet life was for him and wanted to do something different. He decided to go to college and either become an engineer or go into the aerospace industry. After a few months at the University of Colorado, he found the pull of puppeteering stronger than he thought, so he decided to take a year off and return to New York to reconsider things. During that time, he picked up one puppeteering credit after another, including supervising the performers manipulating Audrey II, the man-eating plant in Little Shop of Horrors, and being chief puppeteer on The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, followed by directing Jim Henson's Mother Goose Stories which were aired on the Disney Channel. He started directing under his father, who had him directing background performers while he directed the foreground. He advanced further, becoming co-executive producer for the television series Dinosaurs and becoming president of Jim Henson Productions.