Cookie Monster

A roundup of Wednesday morning's arts and entertainment headlines: Cookie Monster wants to host "Saturday Night Live. " ( YouTube ) Surprise! Bristol Palin doesn't win " Dancing With the Stars," Jennifer Grey does. ( Los Angeles Times ) It's not a happy week for Sarah Palin either -- ratings for "Sarah Palin's Alaska" plummet by 40% in the second week of the show. ( Los Angeles Times ) Actress Jennifer Jason Leigh files for divorce from director Noah Baumbach after five years of marriage.

When a Hollywood studio remakes "The Wizard of Oz," L. Frank Baum doesn't have a chance to send out a press release. But the tricky thing about rebooting a property that's only been gone seven years is that the creator is usually around to say something about it. That's just what Joss Whedon did after Monday's news that a young writer named Whit Anderson, who grew up watching "Buffy the Vampire Slayer," would now tackle the new movie. It was largely a jokey missive that Whedon sent to E!

I don't just want to be thin. Thin is passe. No, I wish to be fat-free. I grit my teeth through fat-free creamy ranch dressing. Fat-free jalapeno-cheese bread. And when I feel like living with reckless abandon, fat-free cookies. They exist??? you ask with disbelief. I toy with you not. It seems only the Nabisco people, those whiz-bang bakers of fudge-covered Oreos and Nutter Butter peanut creme patties, understand how to hold the fat and pack a punch.

A roundup of Wednesday morning's arts and entertainment headlines: Cookie Monster wants to host "Saturday Night Live. " ( YouTube ) Surprise! Bristol Palin doesn't win " Dancing With the Stars," Jennifer Grey does. ( Los Angeles Times ) It's not a happy week for Sarah Palin either -- ratings for "Sarah Palin's Alaska" plummet by 40% in the second week of the show. ( Los Angeles Times ) Actress Jennifer Jason Leigh files for divorce from director Noah Baumbach after five years of marriage.

No offense to my mother, but she did invent the worst cookies of all time. And the thing about it was, she did it on purpose. She invented them the summer she had the nasty sweet tooth, the wicked sweet tooth, the Evil Genie of a sweet tooth that commanded her to drive the Rambler screaming down Cheesty Boulevard to the A&P every night right at closing and then pound on the glass doors the manager was trying to lock. "We are closed!" he mouths through the glass. "I will kill you!"

There is a panic in the land, and it started on "Sesame Street." The rumors, they are rampant. Taken together, in dark tones, and one could fear that the beloved boulevard is rapidly transforming into the Avenue of the Politically Correct Puppetariat. Elmo and Zoe are on an exercise routine. Singing vegetables and talking fruit have invaded the neighborhood. Miles has a new song. It is about broccoli.

In response to the letter (Viewers' Views, Oct. 30) from T. L. Ham of South Gate concerning the "shock" experienced from Cookie Monster's grammar on "Sesame Street": Oh, for crying out loud! A. Wolff, El Toro

I just watched "Sesame Street" with my 2-year-old nephew. I was shocked to hear the character Cookie Monster say "Me want some cookies." This is very annoying when I'm constantly correcting my nephew from saying "Me want" to "I want" in his sentences. I thought "Sesame Street" was supposed to be an educational TV show. T. L. Ham, South Gate

When I was a child, the rules of the road were less about driving and more about the banning of certain items and behavior from the car. Flashlights, I remember, were taboo, as were whistles, harmonicas, tape recorders and pinching contests--all of which, according to my father, Distracted the Driver, a capital offense. At the time, I found these rules arbitrary and tyrannical. Now that I have children, I find them logical and beneficial.

Video Bert & Ernie's Word Play. Sony Wonder. 50 minutes. VHS: $10. DVD: $13. Ages 2-6. Move over Elmo. Longtime "Sesame Street" pals Bert and Ernie get top billing as they play hosts of a variety show with a learn-to-read theme in their first direct-to-video special. Naturally, little red superstar Elmo is on hand--pun intended--along with Kermit, Cookie Monster, Grover, Prairie Dawn, Zoe and other familiar and new Muppet pals.

Booster Shots is noticing much online chatter this morning about recent weight loss by the New York Jets' Kris Jenkins -- weight loss attributed to Dr. Siegal's Cookie Diet. Ditto similar weight loss by Nicole "Snooki" Polizzi of "Jersey Shore." Here's Jenkins' explanation of his success, as shared with the Associated Press: Cookie monster: Jets' Jenkins losing weight before training camp with unconventional diet . And here's information on Polizzi's lost poundage from That's Fit on AOL: Jersey Shore: Another Season, Another Fad Diet .  Put them together and what do you have?

I've seen "How to Train Your Dragon" twice. My daughter loves it (the lead dragon reminds us of her cat). And I think it's pretty great too. (Note: Some pretty obvious spoilers heading your way.) Perhaps I'm mellowing in my middle years, but I don't much mind what Entertainment Weekly calls the movie's "layer of age-of-terror allegory about the ignorance bred by jingoism." This refers to the fact that the Vikings in the film have been raised for seven generations to kill dragons: "It's what we do."

Today's episode of "Sesame Street" is brought to you by the number 40. The show that taught innumerable preschoolers that it's not so easy being green (a message that would never pass muster these days) turns middle-aged today, as have the Generation X children for whom it was created. The show's madcap skits busted the myth that children's programming couldn't be educational and entertaining at the same time, let alone occasionally hilarious. And if some of the cleverly sly references -- such as Guy Smiley spoofing "This Is Your Life" for a ratty old sneaker -- went over the target audience's heads, they also drew parents to watch alongside the kids.

THERE'S a new kind of TV villain on "LazyTown," Nickelodeon's popular kids' show. Robbie Rotten, in all his creeping, hand-wringing, nyah-ha-ha evil, plots to keep the village children indoors, occupied with video games and candy. His nemeses Sportacus and Stephanie back-flip to the rescue, demonstrating the joys of fresh air and fitness.

There is a panic in the land, and it started on "Sesame Street." The rumors, they are rampant. Taken together, in dark tones, and one could fear that the beloved boulevard is rapidly transforming into the Avenue of the Politically Correct Puppetariat. Elmo and Zoe are on an exercise routine. Singing vegetables and talking fruit have invaded the neighborhood. Miles has a new song. It is about broccoli.

Leave poor Cookie Monster alone. "Sesame Street's" decision to make the blue glutton eat more healthfully, as an example for its preschool audience, opens the way to limitless depressing good-example-setting by Cookie's pals. Will concerns about bullying require Oscar the Grouch to act more kindly? Modeling less dorkish behavior, will Bert give up his paper-clip collection for good? Woe to the day when Big Bird learns to speak from his diaphragm instead of nasally whining through his beak.

Leave poor Cookie Monster alone. "Sesame Street's" decision to make the blue glutton eat more healthfully, as an example for its preschool audience, opens the way to limitless depressing good-example-setting by Cookie's pals. Will concerns about bullying require Oscar the Grouch to act more kindly? Modeling less dorkish behavior, will Bert give up his paper-clip collection for good? Woe to the day when Big Bird learns to speak from his diaphragm instead of nasally whining through his beak.

Today's episode of "Sesame Street" is brought to you by the number 40. The show that taught innumerable preschoolers that it's not so easy being green (a message that would never pass muster these days) turns middle-aged today, as have the Generation X children for whom it was created. The show's madcap skits busted the myth that children's programming couldn't be educational and entertaining at the same time, let alone occasionally hilarious. And if some of the cleverly sly references -- such as Guy Smiley spoofing "This Is Your Life" for a ratty old sneaker -- went over the target audience's heads, they also drew parents to watch alongside the kids.

For a truly distasteful treat, it's hard to top Colleen Zammer's orange ice cream. It starts off sweet as a summer day -- then wallops the tongue with a taste like rancid fish, so strong you can almost smell the fins and scales. Then again, Zammer's smoothies can be pretty bad too: all liquid on top, with globs of protein at the bottom. And how about the simple butter cookie? Hers taste as if they were baked under the hood of a diesel truck.

It's enough to make the Cookie Monster cry. Shouts of "Cookies! Cookies!" by the "Sesame Street" TV show character may be falling on deaf ears as concerns over bulging waistlines find more Americans changing lifelong habits and turning their backs on the cookie shelves. Instead, some are heading for more healthful snacks, and that has caught Kraft Foods Inc., the largest U.S. cookie maker with an estimated market share of nearly 40%, off guard.