Endangered Species

Actress Penny Marshall was hosting a fashion show for Kmart’s Sesame Street line of clothing when she started to fall off the runway. She grabbed at Big Bird for support — and ripped off his right wing. The quick-thinking actor inside told the kids in the audience not to worry. “It’ll grow back,” he told them. Marshall was unhurt, but says she doubts she’ll ever work with puppets again “now that I injured the bird.” Meanwhile, an actor dressed as Barney the purple dinosaur filming an episode of the Barney & Friends TV show suffered smoke inhalation when a cooling fan in his 60-pound suit shorted out. Seeing something like that “can be really devastating to a 3-year-old,” a show spokeswoman said. “They love Barney and they think that something terrible has happened to him.” (AP, Reuters) ...Actually, it’s the parents: they hope something terrible has happened to him.