A new character has arrived on Sesame Street, and his debut has made history. Recently, a new scene from the long-running children’s show was released online. Dubbed “Showing Confidence with Kal Penn,” the segment features the actor interacting with Grover as well as Ji-Young, the first Asian-American muppet who was introduced on Sesame Street in 2021. Also introduced is young TJ, the first-ever Filipino-American muppet to be on the show. In the video, which you can watch below, TJ speaks with Penn about how he’s trying to learn Tagalog, the native language of his Filipino family.
“Oh, well, I’m learning Tagalog,” TJ says when Penn asks him how he shows his confidence. “It’s a language my Filipino family speaks, and I have confidence because I can always ask my Lola for help when I don’t know a word.”
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The character design was made in collaboration with Filipino-American artist Bobby Pontillas. After TJ’s debut on Sesame Street, Pontillas shared some images on Instagram that included early character designs along with some shots of being on the set. The designer shared the inspiration behind TJ’s look as well.
“I had the amazing opportunity to work with the geniuses at the Sesame Workshop to create a Filipino muppet for [Sesame Street]! Meet TJ!” Pontillas said. “For his look, I based him off of my lifelong friends’ kids, Max and Mateo, thank you for the inspiration lads. I was blessed to collaborate with master puppeteer Louis Mitchell, the loveliest human on earth.”
Also celebrating the character’s arrival was Yinan Shentu, who provided the voice for TJ in addition to doing some of the puppetry work. He also posted to Instagram about introducing TJ, stoked to have a part in bringing the history-making Sesame Street character to life.
His post reads, “Well, it’s finally official… Everyone, I’d like you to meet one of the newest visitors to [Sesame Street] … TJ! This is his first ever appearance, where he learns about confidence with Kal Penn, Grover, and Ji-Young!”
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Sesame Street Continues to Make History
Sesame Workshop
The reveal of TJ on Sesame Street comes in May, which just so happens to be Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month. That distinction was noted by Sesame Street director of talent outreach, inclusion and content development, Rosemary Espina Palcios. She also posted online about how proud she was to bring Filipino representation to Sesame Street more than five decades after the series first premiered.
“Welcome to Sesame Street, TJ!” Palcios’ Instagram post reads. “I’m so proud to help bring some Filipino representation to the neighborhood, and just in time for API Heritage Month to show the range in our diaspora. His first segment with [Kal Penn] and Ji-Young is all about confidence, something I personally feel can help unravel the model minority stereotype.”
Past episodes of Sesame Street can be found streaming on HBO Max, which will officially be rebranded as just Max on May 23. PBS has also made a variety of full episodes and clips available to stream at the PBS Kids website.
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