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NEW YORK, Aug 6, 2006 (UPI via COMTEX) -- When the 37th season of "Sesame Street" begins this month, New York's Sesame Workshop will introduce viewers to its new female Muppet star, Abby Cadabby.
The character -- a 3-year-old fairy -- resulted from Sesame Workshop Executive Director Liz Nealon's decision to create the first lead female character in the history of the popular children's show, The New York Times reported.
Inventing the new magical character was a difficult task for the show's creators, who took more than nine months to come up with a likable character that would embrace femininity without being type-cast as the predictable "girly-girl," the newspaper said.
"If Cookie Monster was a female character," Executive Producer Carol-Lynn Parente said, "she'd be accused of being anorexic or bulimic. There are a lot of things that come attached to female characters."
The new character -- the daughter of a fairy godmother -- will help introduce storylines about differences, once she is introduced on the show's Aug. 14 season premiere.
URL: www.upi.com Copyright 2006 by United Press International
