'Sesame Street' Writer Says Bert and Ernie Are Gay, Show Insists They're Best Friends
A former "Sesame Street" writer is bringing Bert and Ernie out of the closet.
Mark Saltzman confirmed to Queerty that the rumors of their romantic relationship are true, at least from his perspective.
"I remember one time that a column from The San Francisco Chronicle, a preschooler in the city turned to mom and asked 'Are Bert & Ernie lovers?' And that, coming from a preschooler was fun,” Saltzman said. “And that got passed around, and everyone had their chuckle and went back to it.”
He added, “I always felt that without a huge agenda, when I was writing Bert & Ernie, they were [lovers]. I didn’t have any other way to contextualize them.”
Saltzman also explained that he based much of Bert and Ernie's interactions on his own relationship with editor Arnold Glassman.
“I don’t think I’d know how else to write them, but as a loving couple," he noted. "I wrote sketches … Arnie’s OCD would create friction with how chaotic I was. And that’s the Bert & Ernie dynamic. The things that would tick off Arnie would be the things that would tick off Bert. How could it not?"
Still, Saltzman never revealed his inspiration to the head writer or producers of "Sesame Street."
The show itself continues to insist that Bert and Ernie are just best friends and have no sexual orientation: