Let's just get this out of the way: The Henson Studios lot on La Brea in Hollywood is for sale. The Wrap broke the news in late June.
circa 2020And although I'd been able to walk around on my own once before, as a ticketholder for the puppet improv show Puppet Up!—Uncensored that's performed on the lot, word of the sale was enough to light a fire under me to go back and finally take an official tour.
It was built in 1919 as the Charlie Chaplin Studios—hence the statue of Kermit the Frog dressed as The Little Tramp—but The Jim Henson Company purchased it in 1999 and moved in the next year.
It's been designated a Los Angeles Historic-Cultural Monument, so hopefully the sale isn't a threat to its preservation.
The layers of time are pretty incredible—from the original little red schoolhouse that was built for child actors and the crew's kids to study on set, to the original woodworking shop (a.k.a. "The Barn") to the A&M Records recording studio where the world's biggest musical stars recorded "We Are the World" in 1985.
Taking the tour helped me see some of the stuff that'll go away if and when The Jim Henson Company packs its bags and relocates to Burbank—where the Creature Shop's Hollywood operations are already headquartered.
That means original screen-used puppets from The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance (2019)...
...and Turkey Hollow, a Lifetime original movie (2015)...
...as well as Carol's head from Where the Wild Things Are (2009)...
...and numerous awards from the Emmys, the Grammys, and more.
Likely to stay is the old vault where Charlie Chaplin stored highly flammable nitrate films and A&M kept valuable record masters under lock and key... 
...but The Muppet Mural (1984, painted by Coulter Watt) will most certainly move, as it did to LA from Jim Henson's New York City headquarters in 2004.
One of the most special places on the tour may look like just an office, but it's not just any office. It's Charlie Chaplin's old office.
And now it's the office of Brian Henson, heir to the Henson throne and current CEO of The Jim Henson Company.
As a tour attendee, you get to meet him for a few minutes and maybe even ask him a question.
I asked him what his favorite Muppet is—mostly because that's what our tour guide asked us at the beginning of the tour—and, at first, he said he didn't have one. And then he said he supposed it was Kermit, because that's the Muppet that's most like his dad.
It was bittersweet to see their movie slates next to each other—The Great Muppet Caper (1981) directed by Jim and The Muppet Christmas Carol (1992) directed by Brian.
Brian's office also contains original screen-used movie props and costumes—like Captain Hook's hat and crutch, worn and used by Tim Curry in Muppet Treasure Island (1996)—and plenty of Henson Universe figurines (not just from The Muppet Show) that would make any collector drool.
Besides the tour, Puppet Up! also provides the opportunity to see a show—and not just on the lot.
Actually on the Charlie Chaplin soundstage.
I actually thought I didn't need to see the show again, after having seen it once in 2018.
Maybe the feeling that it might be my last chance made me appreciate it all the more this time around.
It also made me determined to find those damn Charlie Chaplin footprints I'd been hearing so much about over the years...
...which turn out to be cast from the original sidewalk that then-studio owner Red Skelton had removed and shipped off to the University of Indiana.
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