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Kevin Clash and Elmo (Bill Thompson, Wikipedia)
Update 11/20/12 4 p.m. Kevin Clash, the voice of Elmo, has resigned from his role on Sesame Street after a second young man stepped forward to accuse the Academy Award-nominated documentary subject of being a sexual predator. 24-year-old Cecil Singleton is asking for $5 million from Mr. Clash, after claiming he met the voice actor on a phone sex line when he was 15. Then he made a pretty large leap in logic, claiming that Clash spent his days at Sesame “preying on teenage boys to satisfy his depraved sexual interests.”
Update 11/13/12 6:20 p.m.: The 23-year-old accuser just recanted his statement. Read below for more details.
Yeah, this is just pretty awful, especially because of all the absolutely terrible, not appropriate jokes and off-color puns that immediately pop into one's head when reading a headline about how the man who played the voice of Elmo for 28 years on Sesame Street left the show over allegations that he molested a little teenage boy. Try not to think about them, okay? It will just make you feel worse.
From TMZ.com:
Kevin Clash -- the man known as the voice of Elmo -- has taken a leave of absence from Sesame Street in the wake of allegations he had a sexual relationship with a 16-year-old boy, TMZ has learned ... allegations Clash adamantly denies.
We've learned ... Sesame Workshop lawyers recently met with a 23-year-old man who claims he and Clash began a sexual relationship 7 years ago ... when he was 16 and Clash was 45.
Clash has acknowledged to TMZ he had a relationship with the young man -- but insists it only took place AFTER the accuser was an adult...
Sources with direct knowledge of the situation tell TMZ ... after the accuser's initial meeting with Sesame Street, the accuser felt Sesame Workshop's lawyers were trying to muzzle him ... so he lawyered up with Andreozzi and Associates -- the firm that represented one of the victims in the Jerry Sandusky child rape case.
So, you know, that's a shitty thing to start your Monday news with. Sorry, folks.
Update: The New York Times learned an hour ago that the young man who accused Mr. Clash of having a sexual relationship with him while he was underage has recanted his previous statement:
Andreozzi & Associates, a law firm that said it represented the accuser said in a statement that “he wants it to be known that his sexual relationship with Mr. Clash was an adult consensual relationship.” The statement added, “He will have no further comment on the matter.”
So maybe the voice of Elmo is just homosexual, and not a child molester. Still, we feel we all lost a lot of innocence in the past two days, and it's yet to be seen whether Mr. Clash will be allowed back on Sesame Street after this scandal.