Shrinkenstein

There are a lot of neat old Jim Henson commercials and short films floating out there on the internet. My favorite are the two industrial films he made for Wilson's meats, but the old Wilkens coffee ads are also priceless. A couple of the lesser known projects he did in these pre-Sesame Street days are advertising films he made for Pak-Nit--a supposed miracle fabric that didn't shrink or stretch in the dryer. The first was "Shrinkel and Stretchel" and the next was "Shrinkenstein" and the final film was "Stretchelstiltskin" (though I am having trouble finding any information on this last film).

"Shrinkenstein" is a better film than "Shrinkel and Stretchel". It has a funnier script and is more like you'd expect from Jim Henson from this VERY zany period in his puppet career. It begins with a mad scientist creating a monster, Shrinkenstein, who has the ability to make clothing shrink in the dryer. Fortunately, the crazy creator comes to his senses and invents Pak-Nit to combat dryer shrinkage. Not hilarious but cute and watchable even for casual Muppet fans.