September 03, 2025
Ryan Garza/Imagn Content Services, LLC
Bonnie Erickson designed and built numerous Muppet characters. She later started a firm with her husband Wayde Harrison that created sports mascots, including the Phanatic and Big Shot.
When the Phillies decided they wanted a new mascot in the late '70s, they placed a call to the reigning master of kooky, otherworldly characters, Jim Henson. But after the Muppets creator heard their pitch, he told them who they really wanted was Bonnie Erickson.
Erickson had been a costumer and designer for the Jim Henson Company, where she crafted beloved characters like Miss Piggy. She struck out on her own — well, with her husband Wayde Harrison — after six years in the Muppet workshop to start a firm. Harrison/Erickson, Inc. was brand new when the Phillies came knocking, but the commission would lead to a decadeslong career as the creative mind behind over a dozen mascots, several of them for Philadelphia institutions.
It was an unexpected trajectory in a life full of them. Erickson started out as a costume designer for theatrical productions in New York. On the advice of her friend Fran Brill, a puppeteer on "Sesame Street," she reached out to Henson in 1970 about a costuming position at his company. Though she didn't fully believe the job was real, she brought her portfolio to Henson and his producer, Diana Birkenfield, and quickly landed the gig.
"I had just finished doing an opera with the designer I worked with, where we used almost all plastic," she said. "I think that appealed to Jim as being very odd. ... The next day, they said, 'Yes, you're hired.'"
Erickson ran the Muppet workshop, a place she remembered as "one of the best, funniest, most wonderful places to work." Just about anyone could pitch a character, and Erickson did. She came up with Statler and Waldorf, the cranky old men who heckle from their balcony, after observing the members of the Yale Club from one of her many late-night taxi rides home. Zoot, the saxophonist for the funky Muppet band Dr. Teeth and the Electric Mayhem, was born from a sketch she did of the Argentinian musician Gato Barbieri.
Her most famous Muppet creation, however, started as a simple missive from the boss. Henson needed three pigs, and one had to be a girl. They were set to appear in the second of two pilots for "The Muppet Show," specifically in a "Planet of the Apes" parody called "Beneath the Planet of the Pigs." As Erickson recalled, the female pig got a lot more glamorous after she was booked to appear on musician Herb Alpert's variety special.
"She got very fancy," Erickson said. "Her eyes became bigger. I had some satin laying around the studio that became draped to her dress. Because she was no longer wearing a uniform for 'Beneath the Planet of the Pigs,' I had to hide the seam of her neck to her body with pearls. So she got pearls. And I also didn't have time to redo the hands, which had originally been hooves, so I made some gloves and wired them and that became the gloves."
Erickson was thinking of the jazz singer Peggy Lee's blonde hair and sass when she made Miss Piggy. After her creation was out in the world, however, she worried that Lee would take the character as an insult rather than the tribute she intended. Why would Lee take offense to such a star?
"Well, she is a pig," Erickson said with a laugh. "But she's a lovely pig, a fashionable pig."
Luckily, Lee loved it.
As much as Erickson enjoyed making Muppets, she'd been itching to start her own studio. She also wanted to move her family back to the United States; production of "The Muppet Show" had taken them to London. Henson was supportive of her decision to leave in October 1976, and even threw her contract work on "Fraggle Rock" and "Sesame Street."
He also sent her that fateful Phillies referral. Erickson was, admittedly, not a sports fan. But her husband and new business partner Harrison was. So the couple took a trip to Veterans Stadium to brainstorm a new character for the team.
Scanning the stands, Erickson thought about what would pop in the crowd. She assumed fans would be decked out in red. Green, then, felt like a good contrast. She landed on a megaphone shape for the mascot's nose to match the team's working slogan: "a Philly fanatic for fans." And after years in the Muppet workshop, the fuzz came naturally.
"Oh I always worked with fur," she said. "I loved fur. I had done a lot of it, of course, at Henson when I was designing stuff, so I was familiar with it. I also knew that it covered seams. It really felt like an animal."
The Phanatic wasn't any animal the city had ever seen. Erickson imagined him as a creature from the Galapagos Islands who somehow landed in Philly and made a home under the ballpark. He loved popcorn and television, and pranking people at every opportunity. He was, like most Erickson originals, a fantasy character — character being the operative word.
Bonnie Erickson designed the Phillie Phanatic soon after starting a firm with her husband Wayde Harrison in the 1970s.
"One of the things we did when we were training the people who performed in our mascots was to give them a backstory," Erickson said. "So that they had a life. When we first did the Phanatic, we recommended that the performer wear it around the house and get used to doing just regular, normal things, like a character would. You know, make your breakfast, watch TV, relax, whatever. As well as doing some improv training, so that they would be able to really do more than just photo ops."
The success of the Phanatic earned Erickson and Harrison work on other Philadelphia projects. They designed Big Shot, the 76ers mascot who rocked shades on the court from 1979-1996. ("We wanted someone who was, let's see, how shall I put it? A sort of smart aleck," she said.) They also created Zookeeni, the Snuffleupagus-like creature who once represented the Philadelphia Zoo. It's unclear when exactly Zookeeni left his enclosure; the zoo could not immediately locate records of his departure.
Erickson got more into sports through her work, and still keeps tabs on her existing mascots like the Phanatic and Youppi, the Montreal Canadiens' hype man. Both now belong to the Mascot Hall of Fame. The Phillies' feral creature in particular remains one of MLB's most popular mascots, a development Erickson attributes to his funny looks and well-maintained appearance. These became a point of contention in 2019, when the team sued Erickson and Harrison over the copyright. The Phanatic got a slight makeover as the case unfolded, but went back to his old look once the Phillies settled.
With a portfolio this varied, it's hard to pinpoint an exact Erickson style. Her characters are pranksters, divas, cranks and beings that defy all characterization. Some sit atop a puppeteer's hand, while others engulf their operator. They're made with felt, faux fur, foam and occasionally a touch of satin.
But perhaps what unites Erickson's impressive catalog is a sense of whimsy. Whether they're firing a hot dog cannon or karate chopping Kermit, her characters are big personalities that encourage kids to be themselves — and grown-ups to tap into their inner children.
"It's funny because as a designer, I like to think that I can do absolute glamorous, wonderful costuming kinds of things," Erickson said. "But I know that I really drift toward funny. And I think that, having been so fortunate as to be part of the Muppet gang and then to have my own business where we sort of perpetuated that feeling amongst the people that work with us, having fun, playing is such an important part of the creative process. And so I think if anything is significant to me in terms of my style, I hope it's humor."
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