The Fraggles take a festive leap beyond the Rock

APPLE TV'S NEW SPECIAL, A 'LOVE LETTER TO THE FANS,' FINDS AN ADVENTURER VISITING A NEW PLACE AS HE STRUGGLES WITH INSPIRATION

- BY AMY AMATANGELO

"The First Snow of Fraggle Rock," with Lele Pons and Gobo, below, plus other Fraggles including a new Gorg baby, airs Dec. 5. "We felt this passion to make a holiday special that could be aired in 15 years and feel just as relevant and meaningful," says John Tartaglia, who voices Gobo.

Photographs from Apple TV

THE HOLIDAYS can be a stressful time even for a Fraggle.

Apple TV's new holiday special "The First Snow of Fraggle Rock," premiering Dec. 5, finds Gobo (John Tartaglia) struggling to write the perfect holiday song. The arrival of only one snowflake adds to Gobo's severe case of writer's block. He wants to write the song everyone is expecting and make it even better than the one he wrote the year before. Tartaglia, who is the puppeteer and voice of Gobo, describes the special as a "love letter to the fans." "The First Snow of Fraggle Rock," from the Jim Henson Co., features several groundbreaking moments for longtime viewers of the series, which first premiered in 1983 and was rebooted by Apple TV in 2022 with "Fraggle Rock: Back to the Rock." "We felt this passion to make a holiday special that could be aired in 15 years and feel just as relevant and meaningful and emotional," says Tartaglia, who is also an executive producer of the special. "There's more music in this. There's more magic in this. There's more effects.

There's a much more complex storyline. There's things you don't always have time to do in a typical episode. It felt like we were firing on all cylinders for the special." For the first time, Gobo goes to "Outer Space," which is how the Fraggles refer to our world.

"We've been contemplating for a while how fun it would be to see Fraggles in the real world," says executive producer Lisa Henson, who is the daughter of Jim Henson and chief executive of the Jim Henson Co.