Jane Henson

Early life

Jane Ann Nebel was born and raised in St. Albans, Queens, she met Henson when she was a sophomore and he a freshman at the University of Maryland, College Park.

Career

Jane Nebel and Jim Henson worked together on the live 1950s television show Sam and Friends, where Jane collaborated with Jim in performing Muppets and devising several of the show's technical innovations, including the use of television monitors to watch their performances in real time. When, in the late 1950s, Jim took a year off from Sam and Friends to travel in Europe, Jane ran the show, with the help of a UMD classmate.

"Among the first of his assignments at WRC was Afternoon, a magazine show aimed at housewives. This marked his first collaboration with Jane Nebel – the woman who later became his wife" They did not begin dating until Jim returned from Europe where he traveled for several months, to be inspired by European puppeteers who look on their work as an art form. They were married in 1959.

Their first child, Lisa, was born the next year, followed by four others: Cheryl (born 1961), Brian (born 1962), John (1965–2014) and Heather (born 1970). When she quit full-time puppeteering in the early 1960s to raise their children, Jim hired Jerry Juhl and Frank Oz to replace her. She helped the newly hired Frank Oz learn how to lip sync, and continued to perform non-speaking muppets on Sesame Street from time to time through at least the eighties. She was also responsible for the hiring of puppeteer Steve Whitmire (who would later take over performing Kermit the Frog and Ernie of "Sesame Street" after the death of Jim Henson in 1990) in 1978 after he gave her an impromptu audition in an Atlanta, Georgia airport restaurant.

In 1990 the Henson Company went into an agreement with Disney to present a live stage show: Here Come The Muppets, at Disney/MGM Studio. Jane was the key player in the development of training and profile development for the walk-around versions of the Muppets. She was able to share the Henson spirit of the ten characters that joined Disney at the time: Kermit, Miss Piggy, Fozzie Bear, Gonzo the Great, Bean Bunny, as well as five members of the Electric Mayhem Band.

Towards the end of her life, Jane conceived the idea of a stylized puppet show based on the Gospel accounts of the birth of Jesus. Together with a small group of collaborators, she created a live theatre piece featuring tabletop manger figure puppets built by the Jim Henson Creature Shop. Jane Henson's Nativity Story premiered at the 2010 Orlando Puppet Festival. After Henson's death in 2013, vignettes from the stage show were used in the CBS television special "A New York Christmas to Remember", narrated by Regis Philbin. A tribute to Henson from family and friends was part of the national broadcast.

Personal life

Jane and Jim Henson married in 1959, they separated in 1986 although they remained close until his death in 1990. In 1992, she established The Jim Henson Legacy to preserve and perpetuate the work of her husband. She served on the boards of the Jim Henson Foundation and the American Center for Children's Television. She and Jim Henson had five children: Lisa (born 1960), Cheryl (born 1961), Brian (born 1963), John (1965–2014), and Heather Henson (born 1970).

Illness and death

On March 20, 2013, her daughter Cheryl revealed that her mother had cancer and was paralyzed; she asked fans to keep Jane in their prayers. Jane Henson died at 78 on April 2, 2013, from cancer at the family home in Greenwich, Connecticut. She was cremated.