I finished Michael Davis' Street Gang: The Complete History of Sesame Street last week, but have been at a loss as to what to say in my review. But after ruminating on my subject for a few days, I feel that I can now attempt a fair criticism of the book.

Let me begin by saying that Street Gang was an extremely well-written and thoughtfully researched work of non-fiction. The information contained within the book in in-depth and meticulous, providing the reader with a sympathetic look into the lives of the amazingly talented group of people behind one of the most phenomenally fun educational programs of our time. Street Gang is an astonishingly balanced and respectful history of the creative presence behind Sesame Street, and the process that went into making it an extraordinary success.

That being said, I hate to tell you that I really did not particularly enjoy this book. I think the reason I did not appreciate it as much as many other reviewers have probably has more to do with my age than the fact that it was not good. Sesame Street premiered about nine years before I was born, and I grew up watching it on PBS. Truthfully... I never did actually grow up, and from time to time I still tune in to see what's happening on the street. It was my love for Sesame Street and all things puppet that drew me to Street Gang: The Complete History of Sesame Street in the first place. Unfortunately, it just couldn't live up to my expectations.

I found Street Gang to be awfully dry. The story of the conception of Sesame Street was interesting, but regrettably the first half of the book is completely bogged down in biographies of "every government bureaucrat and PR lackey that worked on the show during its formative years." I was hoping to read more about the development of the show, and the impact Sesame Street had on children's television in the 21st century. What I found in Street Gang was more a history of all the people that had a hand in making the show happen, and not much about the characters - the real beating heart of Sesame Street.

Street Gang: The Complete History of Sesame Street was overly detailed and much too focused on giving the complete personal histories of the key players in the making of Sesame Street: Joan Ganz Cooney, Jon Stone, David Connell, Sam Gibbon, and Jim Henson. It's just not what I was looking for.

So, I'm in a quandary on how I should rate and recommend this book. If I rate it solely on the writing and information, I would give it 4 stars - if I rate it based on the fact that it was too dry for my taste and I was very disappointed after reading it, I would give it 2 stars. So I'm going to split the difference and give it 3 stars. As for recommending it to other readers, my advice is just to understand what you'll be getting from Street Gang (and what you won't). If you do a little research beforehand - read some good and bad reviews - you probably won't be disappointed. ( )

Where did Kermit the Frog come from and why did Jim Henson carry a purse? At least one of these questions is answered in Michael Davis' new book Street Gang, as he gives a blow by blow account of the growth and development of this children's television icon. I took this book out hoping that I would find a reference in it to a drama teacher that I had in college who was also a puppeteer and had reputedly worked with Henson. No, he wasn't mentioned. The guy only lasted a year, so maybe his story wasn't completely legit, I dunno.

Davis concentrates on the Sesame Street cast and crew, of course, but does mention some of the other projects of Children's Television Workshop and Jim Henson Productions The Electric Company, Fraggle Rock, and my favorite, The Muppet Show. A couple programs Square One TV and 3-2-1 Contact, I had never heard of. It was interesting to hear the back story on many of the actors and puppeteers that made Sesame Street and of it's real creator, CTW's first CEO and Sesame Street producer, Joan Ganz Cooney.


There is also discussion Sesame Street's nemesis, the dreaded Barney, evil champion of saccharine programming for preschoolers and the inspiration, through eroding ratings, for such successful characters as Prairie Dawn, Zoe and, gasp, Elmo. I can take everything but Elmo, which, naturally, has become the shining star of Sesame Street. Two and three year-olds actually do like saccharine, as I observed with my own purple dinosaur watching children back in the early nineties.

This review was brought to you by the letter Q and the numbers 5 and 9.

I'll Never Forget The Day I Read A Book!

The title says "Complete History" but I'd adjust that to read "The Thorough Behind the Scenes History" of Sesame Street. In fact this book contains a lot of pre-history of Sesame Street. It is 100 pages into the book before Davis begins even covering the creation and planning for the series. The first section of the book instead includes in-depth biographies and family histories of key personnel behind the show: co-creator Lloyd Morrisett, Muppet creator Jim Henson, puppeteers Carroll Spinney and Frank Oz, and the star of this book Joan Ganz Cooney, co-creator and executive producer of Sesame Street.

In between the biographies are some chapters on the state of childrens' television in the 50's and 60's, much of it execrable, but a couple of shows are spotlighted - Kukla, Fran, and Ollie and Captain Kangaroo. Both shows inspired Sesame Street and the latter provided a core group of production staff. Following this, there's about another hundred pages of the actual research and creation of the show before Sesame Street debuts on Nov. 10, 1969 to rave reviews.

All of this back story is well-written and quite fascinating but then the ensuing forty year history of the show feels painted over in broad strokes. Davis highlights some of Sesame Street's finer moments in the 70's and 80's and the challenges faced in the 90's when the television executives begin to interfere with the artistic creativity of the writers and performers to encourage marketing in place of education. The last chapters of this book read like an obituary page as the many figures the reader meets in this book decline and die.

Overall this is a well-researched and fascinating book. I found it hard to put down the book even as it veered off into biographical and historical tangents. I just wish the same amount of detail could have been put into describing the history of the show Sesame Street as the viewers saw it. ( )

It is an amazing story. How all the talented, creative people who made "Sesame Street" got to the meeting place of making it happen. Both charming and full of nitty-gritty! ( )

I wasn't very impressed with this book. He spends too much of the book talking about the backgrounds of the people involved with Sesame Street. I was expecting stories about the 20 years of the show but there is hardly any behind the scenes info. Special guest stars on the show only get a couple of sentences of coverage. His style of writing is pretty dry. ( )