My earliest recollection of him was as the villianous paint stealer, Garumpf, who was basically Dennis (or Cosmo) with a big black moustache and a cape.
If 'Dennis' wasn't on the show by then, he probably became a regular after that.
I never really thought about Dennis doing Mr. Moose, but I figured out Fred Rogers did his puppets, so it seems likely that Dennis was behind Moose and Rabbit.
I think I did recognize him as Grandfather Clock, but I never really connected them.
I've been reminescing in other threads, I do remember 'Dennis' dressed as a clown, mime if you will, and he would do musical videos, basically, tho he wasn't playing the music.
He did build a little fishing scene once, and the guy making it never really got into the video shot until toward the end so you could see it was Dennis.
But of the minstrel clown bits, the only two I recall was one where he was standing at a split mirror, black background, and when he held one hand out, it looked like he was holding both hands out and now there was a rope magically appearing in front of him and floating in the air (I don't think I quite understood how it was a mirror).
The other one, the screen was split into four squares and Dennis was in each one. Each square had a different color tint to it; red, blue, yellow, green, and Dennis in each square was holding a different musical instrument.
when Dennis did this 'character' he was in a striped shirt, suspenders and wore a little clown cap and his face was painted white. Very mime like, as it just dawned on me he was in the near identical costume of the clown character that would appear on Animaniacs and talked like Jerry Lewis.
Well, when they did the four squares, they played a tune and the Dennises would act like they were singing along with it, just going 'Ahhhhh'
DECADES later, I would hear this very same tune on an easy listening station (for the late nineties or new millenium, they would play stuff by Rosemary Clooney or Bing Crosby, that's how easy listening they were). No idea what it was called. I just sat and listened.
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