The Los Angeles puppetry community is mourning the loss of puppeteer Pat Brymer, who passed away this weekend after a lengthy illness.
Generations of Americans grew up watching Pat’s work, even if they didn’t know his name. Often called “The Father of Lambchop”, he had a longstanding collaboration with Shari Lewis (and later her daughter Mallory), and was responsible for building and assisting with Shari’s famous characters Lambchop, Hush Puppy and Charlie Horse on Shari’s television series Lambchop’s Play and Along and The Charlie Horse Music Pizza in the 1990s, as well as many others.
Adult audiences likely remember Pat’s iconic work as the Gopher in the `80s comedy classic Caddyshack. He worked on dozens of other widely seen productions over the course of his career, including The Bananna Splits and other projects by Sid and Marty Kroft, the long-running “McDonaldland” ad campaign for McDonald’s, and classic movies like Team America, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, and Short Circuit.
Pat was also a beloved, long standing member of the Los Angeles Guild of Puppetry, and supported the development of puppetry in Los Angeles by teaching workshops and serving as a member of the L.A. Guild’s Board of Directors for many years. Plans for a memorial are no doubt complicated by the ongoing coronavirus crisis, but one is planned for the future.
14/04/20 Update: This has been updated to include additional information posted by the Los Angeles Guild of Puppetry on their Facebook page.
