Mack Wilson stood on the fringe of a dark, cool sound stage and stared intently at the monitor before him, waiting for the director's cue. Wilson slipped his right hand into a mechanical glove, hard-wired to a master-control computer. His left hand gripped a joy stick that would drive Nintendo junkies giddy--a swiveling wrist mechanism, separate push-buttons for each finger and an independent joy stick for the thumb.

Twenty-five feet away on a dense jungle set spilling over with fog and prehistoric flora, Bill Barretta also waited for the director's cue. Barretta, in constant contact with Wilson via radio headset, squatted inside a hot, sweaty foam-latex dinosaur suit. An assistant held a small electronic fan to the mouth of the fubsy dinosaur to cool off Barretta.

Meet the puppet team behind--and inside--Earl Sinclair, the megalosaurus star of ABC's prime-time comedy series, "Dinosaurs," from Jim Henson Productions and Michael Jacobs Productions with Walt Disney Television.

Remember when puppets weren't much more than a sock with buttons for eyes? The walking, talking, mugging creatures from "Dinosaurs" are prodigies of electronic, mechanical and computer engineering, manipulated by performance artists who have made it their life work.

"Dinosaurs," a 1950s-style sitcom about a wise-cracking family of blue-collar dinosaurs whose daily lives are a comment on modern times, stomped its competition during a smash five-episode run beginning last April. The premiere episode of the series, accompanied by a banzai of network promotion, was seen by three out of four children watching television in America that night. For several weeks, "Dinosaurs" ranked in the Top 10 of all series on television and was the No. 1 show among all viewers under 50.

But this fall, "Dinosaurs" has been suffering through something of an Ice Age.

Encouraged by early promise, ABC this season took a chance with "Dinosaurs," pulling the fledgling series from its sheltered Friday-night time slot--behind ratings powerhouse "Full House"--to head up ABC's Wednesday-night comedy block. The results have been mixed. "Dinosaurs" retained its core audience, remaining the most-watched TV show by children 2 to 11. But the series plunged in overall ratings. Last week, "Dinosaurs" finished 43rd out of 93 shows on the four major networks and regularly finishes second in its time slot.