Master of Puppets
A Lake Mary High School alum wins an Emmy for his writing for Kermit, Miss Piggy, and the rest of The Muppet Show gang
For a few extraordinary moments this past September, Andrew Williams and four fellow writers stood backstage at the 2026 Emmy Awards, trying to absorb the amazing thing that had just happened.
Their work on The Muppet Show, streaming on Disney+, had earned them the Emmy for Outstanding Writing for a Variety Special at the 78th Primetime Emmy Awards. For Andrew, a 1995 Lake Mary High School graduate who watched the original series as a kid, the win was especially sweet.
“It was a completely surreal – and unexpected – experience,” says Andrew, now a Los Angeles-based writer, director, and producer. “But the moment that stays with me most is the most human one, when the five of us just stood quietly offstage in shock and took in the moment together.”
The surreal part included looking out from the stage at an auditorium full of people and cameras and then being ushered through a maze of press rooms and into one with hundreds of Emmy statuettes lined up on a table.
The writing experience, and the Emmy win, brought back core memories of time spent with his dad.
Like Father, Like Son
“I grew up watching The Muppet Show in reruns with my dad every night,” says Andrew, “and it is my earliest memory of watching something that we both enjoyed.”
Andrew’s role on the writing team drew on years of experience directing and producing Muppet productions. Working alongside writers with backgrounds in stand-up, late-night television, and scripted comedy, he concentrated on visual humor and the physical possibilities of puppetry. Andrew sometimes sketched frames to help the group imagine how a joke might play on-screen.
“We very much wrote together as a unit,” he says, adding that every scene reflected the contributions of the entire team.
That collaborative spirit has roots here in Seminole County. Andrew grew up in Longwood and immersed himself in theater and television production at Lake Mary High School, where he jokes that he was “less active in stuff like math and chemistry.”
“We didn’t have much in the way of [TV and theater] resources at the time,” he says, “but it taught me to be creative, scrappy, and resourceful, and to view limitations as opportunities.”
Lake Mary also brought him something even more lasting: his wife, Sarita. The two met and began dating as students and now have two daughters, Leela (15) and Priya (11).
After graduating from Florida State University’s film school, Andrew moved to L.A., where he has lived ever since. His career has included collaborations with Disney and the Muppets. He directed the Emmy-nominated Muppet Babies: Play Date, executive produced the Emmy-nominated Muppets Haunted Mansion, and contributed to Walt Disney Animation Studios’ short film Once Upon a Studio.
His other projects have included producing and serving as creative director for Marvel Studios’ The Infinity Saga Concert Experience, which premiered at the Hollywood Bowl in 2024, and coproducing independent science-fiction and horror films, including entries in the V/H/S franchise.
Closer to home, Andrew recently directed video media and animatronic performances for the Muppet-themed Rock ‘n’ Roller Coaster at Disney’s Hollywood Studios in Orlando.
Like Father, Like Daughters
Andrew’s daughters, who have grown up around the Muppets, were thrilled by his Emmy win.
“There is real affection [for the characters] there,” he says. “They were super excited when I texted them to let them know we won.”
Despite living across the country, Andrew and his family maintain close ties to Central Florida. His mother still lives in Longwood, and some of his closest L.A. friends are fellow Lake Mary graduates.
Looking back, Andrew is grateful for a career that has allowed him to fulfill so many childhood dreams, from working with Marvel and Walt Disney Animation Studios to helping bring a Walt Disney World attraction to life. At the top of that list is writing for the beloved Muppet characters who captured his imagination as a child – and bringing home an Emmy for it.
“To write for these characters in this format was such an incredible honor,” says Andrew.