Sesame!

Sesame!
GenreEducational
Country of originPhilippines
United States
Original languagesEnglish
Filipino
Production
Production companiesPhilippine Children's Television Foundation
Children's Television Workshop
Original release
Release1983 (1983) –
1984 (1984)
Related
Batibot

Sesame! was the Filipino co-production of the American children's television program, Sesame Street. It ran for a single season in 1983, after which it was replaced by Batibot.

Production

Sesame Street first aired in the Philippines in 1970.[1][2]

Negotiations for a localized production began in 1983, and the series was jointly created by Children's Television Workshop and the Philippine Sesame Street Project (PSSP), which was funded by the Philippine government.[3][4] The English segments were filmed in the United States, while the Tagalog segments were filmed in the Philippines.[5]

The choice was made to have turtle and monkey muppets due to those animals' frequent appearances in Philippine folk tales.[1]

Cancellation

Government support for the show was pulled in 1984 after the Philippine economy collapsed.[2][3] The Philippine producers were unable to afford their half of the co-production, and the arrangement dissolved.[3]

Much of the show's crew and cast created the Philippine Children's Television Foundation, Inc. (PCTVF).[3] This foundation went on to create Batibot, which maintained much of the Sesame Street formula while being produced solely by a Filipino team. The show was able to retain use of the Pong Pagong and Kiko Matsing puppets due to a license agreement with Children's Television Workshop.[5]

Content

The show ran for an hour, with one half in English and one half in Tagalog.[3][4][5][6]

Messaging focused in part on teaching children a "sense of nationhood".[4]

Characters

Muppets

Humans

References

  1. ^ a b c d e Lohr, Steve (1985-07-24). "HOME-GROWN VALUES REPLACE KERMIT IN FILIPINO VERSION OF 'SESAME STREET'". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2023-03-23.
  2. ^ a b "Filipino Sesame Street facing tough times – UPI Archives". UPI. Retrieved 2023-03-23.
  3. ^ a b c d e Cipanas (1991). "Batibot : towards the development of supplementary modes of education for Filipino children". AMIC ICC Seminar on Children and Television: 8.
  4. ^ a b c Gettas, Gregory J. (1990). "The Globalization of "Sesame Street": A Producer's Perspective". Educational Technology Research and Development. 38 (4): 60, 62. doi:10.1007/BF02314645. ISSN 1042-1629. JSTOR 30218580 – via JSTOR.
  5. ^ a b c Cana, Paul John (7 September 2020). "Here's the Real Story of Batibot's Pong Pagong and Kiko Matsing". Esquire Magazine. Retrieved 23 March 2023.
  6. ^ Grana, Rhia D. (11 October 2020). "Nostalgia: The untold stories of 'Batibot,' according to Kuya Bodjie". ABS-CBN News. Retrieved 23 March 2023.
  7. ^ Yanoria, Luigene (18 September 2014). "Susan Africa is not your typical poor nanay on TV". Yahoo News. Retrieved 2023-03-24.