Sesame Street has been a staple educational children’s show for the past 50 years. It has played a huge part in the childhood of several generations. Many friends have come to visit and stay on Sesame Street, and its most recent addition is TJ, the first Filipino muppet. 

TJ was created by Fil-Am animation director Bobby Pontillas. He was nominated for an Oscar in 2019 for his short film One Small Step. 

“I had the amazing opportunity to work with the geniuses at the Sesame Workshop to create a Filipino muppet for Sesame Street ,”said Bobby. “Meet TJ!” 

In an Instagram post, Bobby shared how TJ’s look was based on the kids of his two lifelong friends.

“For his look, I based him off of my lifelong friends’ kids, Max and Mateo, thank you for the inspiration lads,” he shared.

Bobby thanked master puppeteer Louis Mitchell who collaborated with him, as well as puppeteer and voice actor Yinan Shintu for bringing TJ to life. 

Rosemary Espina Palacios, Sesame Workshop’s director of Talent Outreach, Inclusion, and Content Development, also played a big part in bringing TJ to the show. 

“Welcome to Sesame Street, TJ! I’m so proud to help bring some Filipino representation to the neighborhood, and just in time for API Heritage Month to show the range in our diaspora,” she shared on her own Instagram post. 

In TJ’s first segment, he was joined by Grover, Harold and Kumar star Kal Penn, and Korean-American muppet Ji-Young. They talked about the word of the day: confidence. 

In their conversation, TJ shared how he was learning Tagalog. 

“I’m learning Tagalog. It’s a language my Filipino family speaks,” shared TJ. “And I’m confident because I can always ask my lola for help when I don’t know a word.”

Rosemary believed that such discussions could be beneficial in battling stereotypes. 

“His first segment with Kal Penn and Ji-Young is all about confidence, something I personally feel can help unravel the model minority stereotype,” she said.

There have been numerous efforts to address the call to practice diversity, equality, and inclusion. Part of this discussion is the need for representation in media and other platforms. 

This advocacy is something that the popular children’s show Sesame Street has actively taken part in. In the summer of 2020, Sesame Workshop launched Coming Together, a racial justice initiative. 

In November 2021, the show welcomed Ji-Young, the show’s first Asian American muppet. Ji-Young is seven years old and is of Korean-American descent. According to the Sesame Workshop, Ji-Young was meant to play an active part in countering the anti-Asian bias and harassment that was surging at that time. 

“I think having this Muppet who is more culturally specific and is able to speak another language, especially in the current time of rising anti-Asian hate, is so essential to representation,” noted sociology professor Nancy Wang Yuen. 

“You know what’s really cool about Sesame Street is that no matter what you look like, or how you play or where you come from, you belong, and that’s really cool,” said Ji-Young when she first joined the show.