Lyle Conway is an American actor, puppeteer, and designer, best known for his work with Jim Henson on The Dark Crystal and his work on Little Shop of Horrors through the creation of the Audrey II puppet.
29 Facts About Lyle Conway
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Lyle Conway gained interest in the world of fantasy creatures as a child through the TV show Kukla, Fran, and Ollie, and the film King Kong.
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When Lyle Conway was older he attended art school where he won several awards from the Art Institute of Chicago before moving on to Hollywood.
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Lyle Conway worked as a social worker for four years and then went on to design for a leading toy company.
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Lyle Conway then began his work in Hollywood with Gene Warren and David Allen.
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Lyle Conway worked under Jim Henson in the Creature Shop where he began his work sculpting Miss Piggy for the fifth season of The Muppet Show and The Great Muppet Caper.
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Lyle Conway worked as a sculptor for characters like Miss Piggy and the Dodo.
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Lyle Conway was the creator behind Lyle the Dog, and the character was named after him.
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On Dark Crystal, Lyle Conway was the design and fabrication supervisor of creature development He worked specifically on Skeksis, Urskeks, and Aughra where he developed cable and radio control mechanisms through the creation of their animatronic characters.
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Lyle Conway built and designed the Aughra puppet used in the film.
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Lyle Conway led the design team on Disney and Walter Murch's film Return to Oz.
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Lyle Conway returned to the Jim Henson Creature Shop to work on the film Dreamchild where he oversaw the shop for the film.
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Lyle Conway described it as, "one-fourth the work of The Dark Crystal at ten times the speed", where they created six creatures in fourteen weeks.
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Lyle Conway worked on the film Link where he was a creature effects supervisor as well as a consultant on the film.
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Lyle Conway created the animatronics used in the TV movie Red Crow and the Ghost Ship.
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One of the animatronics that Lyle Conway worked on was the Red Crow.
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Lyle Conway worked on the TV movie The Murders in the Rue Morgue as a puppet designer and creator.
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Lyle Conway worked under Frank Oz on Little Shop of Horrors where they created and designed the Audrey II puppet.
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When Lyle Conway was designing the puppet he looked towards flower shops and botanical gardens to look for inspiration.
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Lyle Conway wanted Audrey II to be a cross between a cactus and Ukrainian eggs.
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Lyle Conway wanted to make Audrey II into something precious that Seymour would take home with him.
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Oz wanted to make Audrey II look soft and Lyle Conway wanted to make it look horrific so they had to compromise and ended up creating the Audrey II used in the film.
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Lyle Conway began creating Audrey II through the creation of working prototypes that they named the "Feed Me" Plant.
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Lyle Conway used cables, radio controls, and hydraulic pumps to achieve the movement seen in the film and foam rubber and cables to create the puppet.
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Lyle Conway worked on The Blob where he focused on the special effects and was one of the designers.
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Lyle Conway was originally in charge of the film's effects but after personnel changes, Tony Gardner took over.
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Lyle Conway was the associate producer on the film Trinity and Beyond: The Atomic Bomb Movie.
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Lyle Conway worked as a painter on the film's crew.
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Lyle Conway worked for Jim Henson's creature shop on the 2009 film Where the Wild Things Are.