--- title: Sesame Street's 'Big Birdman' Is the Existential Parody We Need description: How did we get here? How did we get to Sesame Street? canonical: https://time.com/3716406/oscars-birdman-big-bird/ author: Laura Stampler article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-02-20T16:10:11.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T07:17:02.566Z og:title: 'Big Birdman' Is the Perfect Parody for Oscar Night og:description: How did we get here? How did we get to Sesame Street? og:url: https://time.com/3716406/oscars-birdman-big-bird/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: 'Big Birdman' Is the Perfect Parody for Oscar Night twitter:description: How did we get here? How did we get to Sesame Street? twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # _Big Birdman_ Is the Perfect Parody for Oscar Night by [Laura Stampler](/author/laura-stampler/) ## Laura Stampler Feb 20, 2015 4:10 PM CUT by [Laura Stampler](/author/laura-stampler/) ## Laura Stampler Feb 20, 2015 4:10 PM CUT For your consideration: _Big Birdman_. Perhaps the greatest press that Oscar-nominated _Birdman_ could get before Sunday’s Academy Awards is this reboot by Mashable and Sesame Street — which has essentially become _Saturday Night Live_ for the juice box drinking demographic and their parents. In the video, Caroll Spinney, the man who has voiced Big Bird for 45 years, is haunted by the feathered puppet. How did we get here? How did we get to _Sesame Street?_ \[time-brightcove videoid=4069581101001\] ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3716406/oscars-birdman-big-bird/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3716406/oscars-birdman-big-bird/"},"headline":"Big Birdman Is the Perfect Parody for Oscar Night","datePublished":"2015-02-20T16:10:11.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T07:17:02.566Z","description":"How did we get here? How did we get to Sesame Street?","url":"https://time.com/3716406/oscars-birdman-big-bird/","keywords":["Newsfeed","Television","Comedy","viral"],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Laura Stampler","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/laura-stampler/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-newsfeed/","name":"Newsfeed"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3716406/oscars-birdman-big-bird/","name":"Big Birdman Is the Perfect Parody for Oscar Night"}}]}] ```