Tim Lagasse

Timothy Lagasse (born February 20, 1969) is an American puppeteer, puppet designer and director. He has worked on television programs and films for Sesame Workshop, Nickelodeon, Disney XD, and HBO. He is known for playing the title character on Noggin's Oobi, and Crash on Disney XD's Crash & Bernstein.

Lagasse has been nominated for three Daytime Emmy Awards. In 1991, he became the first individual to receive the Jim Henson Memorial Prize in Puppetry. In 1993, he was presented with a Citation for Excellence by UNIMA. Later in the same year, he received a Broadcast Design Silver Award for his series of short films, A Show of Hands. In Jack's Big Music Show, Lagasse was the puppeteer for Sleezo, Earl, and the father of Spunky, as well as serving as the lead puppet designer/builder.

Biography
Lagasse hails from Milford, Connecticut. He attended St. Mary's School and Notre Dame High School in West Haven. He graduated from the University of Connecticut in 1992 with a BFA in Puppet Arts.

Lagasse's earliest project he worked on was Nickelodeon's Eureeka's Castle, in which he and Joey Mazzarino got their starts as puppeteers. Lagasse's next role was that of Mr. Cook on fellow Nickelodeon series Allegra's Window. He also played the title character on Noggin's Oobi series, and Crash on Disney XD's Crash & Bernstein. He has performed additional characters on Sesame Street, The Muppets and the 2008 film A Muppets Christmas: Letters to Santa. In addition to his performance credits, he has built puppets for The Jim Henson Company and Puppet Heap.

Lagasse also teaches the art of puppetry, lecturing at the Lincoln Center Foundation and instructing students on modern puppetry techniques at the University of Connecticut's Puppet Arts Program. In 2011, he offered workshops on building puppets at the University of Central Arkansas as part of Heather Henson's Handmade Puppet Dreams Film Festival. In 2012, he traveled to Haiti with No Strings Productions as a puppet workshop trainer.

Trivia

 * In an episode of Puppet Tears, he said that his very first minute on Allegra's Window, he broke one of the props and thought his career was over.
 * Speaking of Allegra's Window, he assisted 3 puppeteers in the show: Kathryn Mullen, Pam Arciero, and Martin P. Robinson.