{"id":60680,"date":"2026-01-05T19:03:34","date_gmt":"2026-01-06T00:03:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/?p=60680"},"modified":"2026-01-05T19:03:37","modified_gmt":"2026-01-06T00:03:37","slug":"former-muppets-puppeteer-among-stars-at-lakeland-con-next-weekend","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/2026\/01\/05\/former-muppets-puppeteer-among-stars-at-lakeland-con-next-weekend\/","title":{"rendered":"Former Muppets puppeteer among stars at Lakeland con next weekend"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Steve Whitmire with Kermit the Frog At the San Diego Comic Con 2015 Muppets panel. Credit:\u00a0Ewen Roberts from San Diego, CA, United States, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Central Florida Comic Con brings a heavy dose of 90s and 2000s nostalgia to Lakeland next weekend.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For its seventh year, the con features several voice actors from the original \u201cTeenage Mutant Ninja Turtles\u201d cartoon, as well as voices from shows like \u201cDigimon,\u201d \u201cNaruto,\u201d and \u201cBleach.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Puppeteers Steve Whitmire (formerly Ernie in \u201cSesame Street,\u201d Kermit the Frog and other Muppets) and Noel MacNeal (\u201cBear in the Big Blue House,\u201d \u201cEureka\u2019s Castle\u201d) will be there at the RF Funding Center, though no word on their fuzzy former costars.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The lineup also includes comic creators, authors, and actors, including Lucas Grabeel, aka the gay guy in \u201cHigh School Musical\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Serious cosplayers can shine in the two-day costume contest, which requires online pre-judging<\/a> at least 75% of an entrant\u2019s costume to be handmade or altered.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A \u201cStreets of Thunder\u201d wrestling show happens Saturday at 6:30.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tickets start at $10 for Central Florida Comic Con happening Saturday-Sunday, Jan. 17-18 in Lakeland.<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Central Florida Comic Con brings a heavy dose of 90s and 2000s nostalgia to Lakeland next weekend. For its seventh year, the con features several voice actors from the original… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":60681,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"12","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","inline_featured_image":false,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"wpai_generated_summary":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":true,"token":"eyJpbWciOiJodHRwczpcL1wvaTAud3AuY29tXC9sYWtlbGFuZGdhemV0dGUuaW5mb1wvbmV3c1wvd3AtY29udGVudFwvdXBsb2Fkc1wvMjAyNlwvMDFcL0tlcm1pdF93aXRoX1N0ZXZlX1doaXRtaXJlXzE5MDAwMDY4MDI0LXNjYWxlZC0xLndlYnA_Zml0PTc4MCUyQzYwMiZzc2w9MSIsInR4dCI6IkZvcm1lciBNdXBwZXRzIHB1cHBldGVlciBhbW9uZyBzdGFycyBhdCBMYWtlbGFuZCBjb24gbmV4dCB3ZWVrZW5kIiwidGVtcGxhdGUiOiJoaWdod2F5IiwiZm9udCI6IiIsImJsb2dfaWQiOjE2MzA0MDY2MX0.J_tykEDIx1xeUCMeIig-bIjyhqiWLxEdVKmeDViU_GMMQ"},"version":2,"attached_media":[{"id":60681,"url":"http:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/Kermit_with_Steve_Whitmire_19000068024-scaled-1.webp","type":"image\/webp"}]},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false},"categories":[12,14],"tags":[13103],"class_list":["post-60680","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local","category-news","tag-former-muppets-puppeteer-among-stars-at-lakeland-con-next-weekend"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60680","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=60680"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60680\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":60682,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60680\/revisions\/60682"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/60681"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=60680"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=60680"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=60680"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}