Play With Me Sesame

***Play with Me Sesame*** is an original series created by Noggin and Sesame Workshop. When the show was made, Sesame Workshop co-owned the Noggin channel. The show is a spin-off of *Sesame Street* created specially for Noggin. It features interactive segments hosted by four characters: Bert, Ernie, Grover, Prairie Dawn.

The show is unique in that it was the first and only time an outside company (Nickelodeon) made its own series with the *Sesame Street* characters. The show started development in 1999, when the Jim Henson Company still had partial rights to the characters; to start production, Nick had to seek the company's approval. *Kidscreen* reported that "the series marks the first time a State-side entity other than Sesame Workshop has been given permission by Henson to use the *Sesame Street* Muppets."

The show premiered on April 1, 2002. This was the same day that Noggin redesigned itself to include a daytime block for preschoolers. *Play with Me* was the "anchor series" of the block and the main attraction of the revamped Noggin. The show continued to air on Noggin until September 2, 2007 as Nickelodeon lost the rights to air the series. Reruns started airing on the Sprout channel (now Universal Kids) on September 26.

## History

The show's animated segments, computer games, and intro sequence were animated by Nickelodeon's New York studio, Nick Digital. (source)

The original broadcasts of each episode included videos of kids sent to Noggin by their parents. The videos were first collected in March 2002 as part of a campaign on Noggin's website, where parents were asked to send in any play-themed videotapes they had of their kids. The campaign advertised *Play with Me Sesame* as "Ernie & Bert's new show." The original page for the campaign can be found here and here.

## Summary

The series mixes classic Muppet footage with brand-new interactive segments. Bert, Ernie, Grover, and Prairie Dawn are the main hosts. The host segments also feature guest appearances by Cookie Monster, Zoe, Slimey the Worm, and Ernie's cousin Ernestine.

## Cast

* **Bert** - Played by Eric Jacobson
* **Ernie** - Played by Steve Whitmire and John Tartaglia
* **Grover/Super Grover (Season 2)** - Played by Eric Jacobson
* **Prairie Dawn and Zoe (Season 2)** - Played by Fran Brill
* **Cookie Monster, Chicago the Lion and Ernestine (Season 2)** - Played by David Rudman
* **Slimey the Worm (Season 2)** - Played by Martin P. Robinson

## Segments

* **Ernie Says** - A game similar to "Simon Says," hosted by Ernie as he asks the viewers to imitate him. This game usually appears at the start of each episode, and Noggin's website says that it was designed to get "kids up and playing along right from the start."
* **Prairie Dawn's Art Class** - A segment where Prairie Dawn showcases drawings made by users of Noggin.com. Viewers were encouraged to visit Noggin's website and send in their own videos, drawings, photographs, e-mails and other creations. On two episodes, Grover and Prairie Dawn sing "Old MacDonald Had a Farm" with the drawings, and Cookie Monster eats the keys off of Prairie Dawn's piano.
* **Sesame Computer** - The gang plays games on the computer from their website at Noggin.com, such as "Oatmeal Art", "Pigeon Patterns", "Perfect Pair", and "Ducks in a Row".
* **Classic Muppets** - Archive footage from classic episodes of *Sesame Street* were integrated into the series.
* **Move and Groove with Grover** - A music video is played for the viewers to dance along with. Grover often interrupts the video to add commentary or tell the viewer more about the video. Other times, Grover sings basic songs such as "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star" or "A Very Simple Dance." Noggin describes this segment as a way to incorporate "beloved *Sesame Street* songs" into the show.
* **End Segment** - A short and final game of Ernie Says is played. The first statement is usually "Ernie says, say goodbye..." The special circumstance in which the characters say goodbye ties into the theme. For example, Ernie says to say goodbye while wiping windshield wipers in the car-themed episode.

## Episodes

The show had three seasons and 104 episodes in total.

## Online

The show had a major presence on Noggin's website, Noggin.com, which was a big part of the show itself. Kids could submit their own artwork to Noggin to see it featured on the show. The "Sesame Computer" segments featured Bert and other characters playing games that were available on Noggin.com.

* 2002 show description
* Page for Noggin's live tour of the series

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## Links

* *Kidscreen* article
* Sesame Workshop article from 2007