Mae Canaga

Mae Canaga is a retired costumer and puppet builder who worked on many of the Sesame Street Live shows and both Muppet Show stage shows. Canaga was responsible for the building and mechanical animation of the walk-around characters' heads, often working in collaboration with her daughter Marilee Canaga. She was also involved with Jim Henson's Creature Shop on Dinosaurs and Aliens in the Family.
In the late 1960s, Canaga was the co-host of two children's programs on KKOG-TV, a short-lived independent television station based out of Ventura, California: A Child's Happening, which featured some of her puppet characters, and the crafts program Art Unlimited.About KKOG's Programs Mae and Marilee later worked for the Universal Studios theme park; Mae helped build Tiger, a large puppet for the An American Tail: Fievel Goes West attraction, while both Canagas cleaned and maintained the animatronic King Kong among other tasks.Quintanilla, Michael. "Beautifying the Beast : Couple Works All Night to Keep King Kong Looking His Scarifying Best." Los Angeles Times. September 16, 1992. Both mother and daughter were specialty costumers on the 2000 film How the Grinch Stole Christmas.
==Muppet/Henson credits==
* Sesame Street Live: Mechanical animation
** A Sesame Street Mystery: The Case of the Missing Rara Avis
** Big Bird's Super Spectacular Totally Amateur Show
** Sesame Jamboree
** Around the World
** Save Our Street
** Big Bird's Sesame Street Story
** Silly Dancing
** Sleeping Birdie
** Let's Play School
** When I Grow Up
* The Muppet Show: On Tour!: Building and animation of heads
* The Muppet Show on Tour: 2nd Edition: Building and animation of heads
* Dinosaurs: Jim Henson's Creature Shop
* Aliens in the Family: Jim Henson's Creature Shop
==Sources==
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Category:Designers