The Letter O

Would you like to buy an O?/Round and neat/A nearly perfect circle/Tidy and complete

Oscar the Grouch

Green, surly and covered in disgusting fur, Oscar is living the dream. Or would be if everyone on Sesame Street would just leave him alone. You see, it's every Grouch's dream to be as miserable and grouchy as possible and to pass that feeling on to everyone else, and Oscar, being a Grouch, is understandably perenially pissed.

Oscar, forever 43 just as Big Bird is forever 6 and Elmo is forever 3, lives next to the stoop of 123 Sesame Street in filthy trash can. He loves trash(as displayed in the song "I Love Trash") and almost never parts with it to the point of Oscar almost never leaving his beloved trash can. In the times when he does has to move, he enlists his chauffer, a sanitation worker named Bruno.

The inspirations for Oscar came from two different places, one as explained in Sesame Street Unpaved, "as inspired by a nasty waiter from a restaurant called Oscar's Tavern in Manhattan. Jim Henson and Jon Stone were waited on by a man who was so rude and grouchy that he surpassed annoying and started to actually amuse both Jim and Jon. They were so entertained that going to Oscar's Tavern became a sort of masochistic form of luncheon entertainment for them, and their waiter forever became immortalized as the world's most famous Grouch." While Oscar's character was created in unlikely circumstances with an awful waiter, his voice came from a very simple situation. Carol Spinney, still stuck on a voice for the character, was on his way to the Sesame Street set for his first day as Oscar when he got into a cab. The taxi driver, with his heavy Bronx accent, said "Where to, mac?" and the voice just got stuck in Spinney's head, so when he went to perform as the Grouch, the accent stuck with the old urban grump.

Despite his terminal grouchiness, Oscar still has to deal with admiration, something he obviously hates. Whether it be from the loyal Grouchketeers or from Telly and Elmo, who think Oscar is a friend, all Oscar wants is to be left alone. Well, that's actually not true because Oscar hates being alone, because then there is no one for him to harass. His favorite targets seem to be the impressionable Big Bird(who he once told that Santa doesn't come to Sesame Street because "the chimneys are too small") and Maria(who he loves to fluster by insulting other cast members).

Oscar came into the world as a way for kids to experience a fun use of non-destructive anarchy and for 40 years has been the first real example of the internet troll for children. He has stayed at that same stoop since he was an orange bastard in Episode 1 of Sesame Street and has grown to have hundreds of cousins all across the globe, including my favorite, Moishe Oofnik, the Israeli Grouch who lives in a car on Rechov Sumsum. Oscar and his kin will forever be the favorite meanies of kids all over.



Okay? Now scram!