The Dark Crystal, Crawlie Bug Puppet

original movie prop

Jen, an elflike “Gelfling” ventures on a quest to restore balance to his alien world by returning a lost shard which is found to be part of the Dark Crystal, and must be reinserted to restore the Crystal's integrity. From the 1982 Jim Henson and Frank Oz film The Dark Crystal, this little creature was known on set as a “Crawlie” and screen used during the banquet scene as the lizard-like Skeksis creatures ate a massive dinner and discussed the escape of Jen. Then repurposed and reused again in the film, The Neverending Story 3. Created by the Jim Henson Creature Shop Brian Froud discussed the creation process for the Crawlies; “When I was a kid there were tin toys with a key on the side, with two flaps, and when you wound them up, they’d scuttle along the floor.  Jim remembered those too, I said Why don’t we just get those and stick something on it? He said, “Great, let’s do that.” And that’s what we did. We bought a bunch of those, sprayed feathers on them, wound them up, and let them go. That’s what you see on the table.”  Sherry Amott also commented, “The crews loved those little bugs and every time they ran across the table, Jim just laughed and laughed and laughed. We all just loved that.”