ed2you: asked “Closely work with Jim Henson did or did not at all in creation of YODA?”

Nick replies: It’s a common misconception that Yoda was built by Jim Henson and the Muppets. Jim’s organization was approached to operate Yoda because what we (the Make-up Department) were doing on ESB, building semi mechanical puppets, was politically incorrect. A union agreement gave the building and operation of puppets to the Props Department and the building of mechanisms to Special Effects. We didn’t want the revolutionary puppet we were building to be passed to another department so by bringing in the Muppets we avoided that.

Jim gave the Job to Frank Oz but was never personally involved with Yoda. Frank discussed what would be acceptable to him and a muppet builder named Wendy Midner joined our team. Her input was very significant.