While kids are stuck at home for the sake of pandemic precautions, Apple TV+ has a few entertainment options for them to enjoy. Daytime Emmy-nominated Helpsters, the latest offering Sesame Workshop, returns for a second season on October 12 only days after the reboot of Ghostwriter.
Helpsters follows four characters - Cody, Heart, Scatter, and Mr. Primm - as they fulfill their passion of helping celebrity guests who appear at their store with various requests. Between firming up a sequence of steps and dividing up tasks based on skill sets, the series very methodically teaches children about teamwork and organization all while singing about high fives and handshakes,
Stephanie D'Abruzzo, a talented puppeteer who has played several characters in the Sesame Street universe as well as originated Kate Monster in Avenue Q, brought Cody to life to answer a few questions for Screen Rant. She was joined by Jordan Geary, who directs development at Sesame Workshop, in order to share the best ways to make plans and help kids in today's world.
What was the inspiration behind Helpsters, and how did you first come up with the idea?
Jordan Geary: Well, honestly, we love Apple as a partner. Apple is just where storytellers go to tell their stories. And at Sesame Workshop, we pride ourselves on being the leading educational entertainment company for kids. When were talking about what we would like to do together, the biggest thing everyone kept on saying is, "We want to help people. We want to help kids." What kind of content can we make that can help kids? Well, why don't we just have a team of monsters called the Helpsters, and all they do is help people?
Since then, things got layered in, so we have a pre-coding curriculum. We teach teamwork, we teach task persistence and overcoming obstacles. But really, at the end of the day, we just want to help people. And it turns out that in the world that we live in right now, that is more important than anything. I think we had some foresight when we were doing that.
It's so important to have a plan whenever you're trying to accomplish a task. What is your plan whenever it's time to help a new customer?
Cody (Puppeteer Stephanie D'Abruzzo): Well, first of all, you've got to listen to the customer. This is what I like to do. Whenever we have a customer come into the shop my favorite question ever is, "How can we help you?" and they tell us their problem. That's when we figure out what we need to do to help them. And when we know what the goal is, then we can make a plan.
When we make a plan, we break it down into little bite-size jobs, so maybe Scatter will do one job, and Mr. Primm will do one job and Heart will do another job over there. Then that way, it's easier. It doesn't seem quite so big anymore. When we do those jobs, do we have these little skills; we sequence, because we have to know the right sequence and the order in which things happen. Like, when you're making a pizza, you've got to know the sequence. You don't put the sauce on first, that's all I'm saying.
Sometimes we use "if and then,” and sometimes we do debugging. If you have a bug in the problem - if the problem doesn't work out - you've got to find the bug and figure out what went wrong. And you also, you just never give up. You can make a mistake, but then you keep on going.
When we do all that, and the job's done, it's such a great feeling. You have no idea how great it is. When I say, "Oh, the job's done!" I feel so good. When they say, "Thank you," and I say, "You're very welcome," it's just so great. I could go on and on about it, but it really is my passion in life.
Another thing I absolutely love is your musical guests. I'm obsessed with Ingrid Michaelson singing about grilled cheese sandwiches now.
Cody (Puppeteer Stephanie D'Abruzzo): And tiny things and sidewalks! We sing about a lot of fun things.
Jordan, how do you get those guests? Do they come up with the songs on the spot or decide on topics beforehand?
Jordan Geary: First off, I'll say we have an amazing team that we're working with. Paul Buckley is the person who actually does the music on the show, so they do have a partnership where we will introduce a song or a topic that we would like. We obviously will collaborate.
But as far as asking people to be involved, it is such a easy process - the easiest process I've ever had in my career. Because when you mention that you are working on something with Sesame Workshop, the makers of Sesame Street, everyone is excited. Not only do some have kids that watch Sesame Street, but so many of them were raised on Sesame Street as well. There's a lot of people out there that not only want to put out great wor, but they want to pay it forward. And they want to figure out a way to make audiences entertained and to help kids and their families out.
So, that call and request that we send out is usually answered rather quickly. It's great, because the more that your talent is passionate about what they're working on, the better everything is.
Cody (Puppeteer Stephanie D'Abruzzo): What's really fun about those songs is we use looping. It's where you make the sounds, and you do them over and over again. So, sometimes all I have to do is go "in the elevator, in the elevator," and then everyone else makes their sounds, and it's like music without instruments. It's amazing.
Cody, is there any problem you have yet to tackle that you would love to help someone with? Or is a villager that hasn't come into your shop yet that you would really like to see?
Cody (Puppeteer Stephanie D'Abruzzo): You know what, we never really know who's going to come into the shop. Everything is just a surprise. I can't even imagine what a potential problem could be, because every time someone comes in, you think you know what it's gonna be - and it's something different.
Like, Gymnast Jenny came into the shop, and you think, "Maybe you need help with your gymnastics and your routine." But you know what? She didn't need help with a routine; she needed help mailing a letter. And you know what? She looked an awful lot like Olympic gold medalist Gabby Douglas, that's all I'm saying.
Anyway, you just never know what kind of help people are going to need. There were other people who came in the shop that just wanted to say, "Hey, help us name our dog." Baxter. We named the dog Baxter, took two seconds. Some jobs are small.
Jordan, you mentioned how it was prescient, almost, that people would need a show like Helpsters now. How has the pandemic affected both the production, and the idea of what this show means for audiences going forward?
Jordan Geary: That's a great question. I'm happy to say that we filmed the bulk of Helpsters before the pandemic, so it wasn't as big of an issue production-wise. We did produce some Helpsters Help You spots at the beginning of the pandemic, and it was fascinating not only to encounter our own problem, and how do we do this when the world is still figuring out how they're producing content during those early days.
But at the end of the day, it's finishing your work day, looking at yourself in the mirror and saying, "The work that we're doing is so important right now." I think it's great and fun to work with some of the people we're working with, the characters we're working with, the creative people we're working with, and Apple. But when you can say, "I think the work we're doing is being seen by a lot of people, and I think they need this content right now," it fills you with this other sense of warmth and passion that you didn't know before. I mean, you knew you had it, but it was in that reserve tank that all of a sudden sparks.
When you produce content like this, where you have a simple idea of, "We just want to help people," you'd be surprised how the world sometimes will step in and say, "Yeah, a lot of people do need this very simple thing that you're trying to teach kids." You never know what's going to happen. You don't hope for something like that to happen, obviously, but you recognize when you need to step up and deliver because people need it.
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Helpsters season 2 arrives on Apple TV+ October 12.