| Mr. Frederick "Fred" Johnson | |
|---|---|
| Sesame Street character | |
Mr. Johnson with Grover in A Celebration of Me, Grover. |
|
| First appearance | 1969 (Fat Blue) 1972 (Mr. Johnson) |
| Voiced by | Jerry Nelson |
| Information | |
| Gender | Male |
Mr. Frederick "Fred" Johnson is Grover's recurring customer at Charlie's Restaurant and other restaurants. He is an overweight, short-tempered man, who has become increasingly frustrated over the years with the service Grover provides. Mr. Johnson was mainly performed by Jerry Nelson, and is mostly seen as a customer at Charlie's Restaurant. Mr. Johnson has also been referred to (usually) as "Sir" by Grover.
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In the restaurant sketches, Mr. Johnson goes to Charlie's Restaurant, which is a table service restaurant, that he visits on a regular basis. Johnson is nice and pleasant, also is impatient and in a hurry, and has no time to wait, while Grover torments and harasses Johnson with his antics and mistakes. Johnson is eventually turned into the angry victim. In the earlier sketches, Johnson was a lot calmer, and Grover was usually the victim. Sketches typically end with Johnson either walking away in a huff, getting hurt, or fainting. Despite the fact that Grover ruins his dining experiences, Johnson always returns to Charlie's.
Other sequences with Grover and Mr. Johnson interactions include sketches on an airplane, at the airport, in a telegram office, at a rent-a-car agency, at fast food or other types of restaurants, at the movies, at a portrait studio, at a baseball game, at a department store, as a hot dog vendor, as a fitness gym trainer, as a salesman, in an art gallery, framing work, and in a taxi. Just as in the restaurant sketches, in these sketches something usually drives Frederick to lose his patience and get very infuriated at Grover.
In two other sketches, Mr. Johnson attends the park, with Grover showing up to annoy him: One sketch, with Mr. Johnson wanting to eat his lunch all alone, whilst Grover is playing the guitar and singing (Mr. Johnson refers to a quote from Casablanca: "Of all the benches in all the parks in the world, I had to pick this one!" ("Of all the stools in all the gin joints in the world, I had to pick this one!")), and another one, with Mr. Johnson wanting two long hot dogs, or two short hot dogs. Attending the Birdland concert (and also nightclub), getting pestered by a band called the Squirrel Nut Zippers singing "Put a Lid On It."
Several sketches also take place in Mr. Johnson's apartment at 14 Sesame Street, where Grover is involved in delivering singing telegrams, also with Elmo, selling wigs, delivering pizza, doing home renovation on Johnson's new house, or other door-to-door activities. In most cases, as with the restaurant skits, Johnson ends up fainting.
In one sketch,[1] Simon Soundman, another Anything Muppet with the same pattern, eats at Charlie's and remarks, "I don't know why my brother recommended this place. The service is terrible."
On June 13, 2011, Jerry Nelson and Frank Oz reprised their respective roles as Mr. Johnson and Grover in a new Sesame Street sketch uploaded on YouTube parodying the recent musical Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark.
Jon Stewart, on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, has referred to Republican National Committee chairman Michael Steele as the "perpetually dissatisfied customer at Grover's restaurant," complemented by footage of Mr. Johnson.
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