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Cookie
Bear - Before there was the Cookie Monster on SESAME STREET,
there was the Cookie Bear, a recurring character featured on THE ANDY
WILLIAMS SHOW/NBC/1969-71.
Usually as Andy Williams was about to sing his signature
song, "Moon River" the Cookie Bear came onstage and asked for a cookie.
And the bear was prepared to beg, borrow, steal or do just about anything
to get the crunchy sweetness of a cookie snack. But try as hard as he
might, at the end of each sketch host Andy Williams would always say "No
cookies! Not now, not ever...NEVER!!!'
Dejected, the Cookie craving bear would fall down in
frustration or walk off stage. But there was always next week when once
again the bear would frantically plead for his heart's desire.
Since 1992, the Cookie Bear act has been resurrected
at Andy William's $12 million state-of-the-art Moon River Theater in
Branson, Missouri (during the Christmas season).
TRIVIA NOTE: Janos Prohaska
(who dressed in a heavy furry bear costume) performed the role of the
Cookie Bear from 1969-71. Janos Prohaska died March 13, 1974 at the age 51
when his Sierra Pacific Airlines flight (802) crashed at 8:28 PM near
Bishop California. The twin-engine Convair CV 440 aircraft (N4819C) was
carrying the production crew for a segment of the ABC TV series "Primal
Man." All four members of the flight crew and the 32 passengers on board
were killed in the crash including Prohaska's stuntman son, Robert.
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