‘Mah Nà Mah Nà’: The song famous by The Muppets was originally from a 1968 Italian softcore sex film
Although most people would associate ‘Mah Nà Mah Nà’ with The Muppets or Sesame Street, this iconic song that’s been sung by children the world over for nearly half a century actually originates from a racy 1968 Italian softcore documentary called Sweden: Heaven and Hell.
The film, which has scenes of swingers parties, nude beaches, porn films and lesbian nightclubs—and even a scene of drug addicts huffing gasoline and eating shoe polish on bread to get high—used the song in the context of its camera ogling several towel-clad blondes cavorting in a sauna giving the scene a comic “leering” quality when a few of them drop their towels and decide to frolic in the snow (because that’s what nude Swedish ladies apparently used to do back then).
Sweden: Heaven and Hell wasn’t exactly a public information film. Directed by Luigi Scattini, it was one of those pseudo-documentary “mondo” jobs that pretended to educate while mostly giving the audience a guilt-free excuse to ogle. Think travelogue spliced with softcore titillation, part sociological survey and part dirty postcard. Sweden, with its reputation for permissiveness, made the perfect backdrop. In reality, it was more exploitation than anthropology, but as far as swinging sixties scandal went, it ticked all the boxes.
Italian cinema composer Piero Umiliani’s original soundtrack score – or at least one number, ‘Mah Nà Mah Nà’ – took on a separate life when it became a novelty hit, reaching number 55 on the Billboard singles chart in October of 1969. It would eventually reach the eighth spot on the British singles chart in 1977. It’s been covered by the likes of the Dave Pell Singers, Tom Jones, Giorgio Moroder, Goldie Hawn, Nancy Sinatra in her Vegas act, and there’s even a Moog version.
Umiliani probably thought he was just knocking out a bit of filler for a saucy Euro flick – job done, on to the next. Instead, this daft tune grew legs of its own. First it pops up on American radio as a novelty hit, then a few years later it’s back in Britain, lodged in the top ten like chewing gum you can’t scrape off your shoe. It wasn’t polished pop, it wasn’t even meant to last, but that nonsense refrain had a way of worming into your head and refusing to shift.
Part of the magic lies in its sheer absurdity. The nonsense syllables and playful scat sound like a send-up of jazz improvisation, but underneath there’s a hook so strong it lodges in your skull after a single listen. It’s comic, yes, but also strangely liberating and a decent reminder that music doesn’t always need to “mean” anything. It’s an inside joke that somehow went public, a wink disguised as a chorus, and it’s hard not to grin when it comes on.
The song was also associated with both Benny Hill and Red Skelton, then it was adopted by bearded hippy puppeteer Jim Henson. The beatnik Muppet character who would become known as ‘Mahna Mahna’ debuted on November 30th, 1969, on The Ed Sullivan Show. An earlier (and less anarchistic) draft of the scene in question actually appeared during the first season of Sesame Street only a few days before the Sullivan show appearance and clearly seems to be a dry run for the later performance.
Mahna Mahna reached his full potential in 1976 on the very first episode of The Muppet Show. The Snowths, as the other characters are called, were both voiced by Frank Oz.
Once Henson and Oz got their felt hands on it, though, the tune found its forever home. The Muppets stretched the silliness of ‘Mah Nà Mah Nà’ until it became sublime. Watching Mahna Mahna riff and digress while the Snowths dutifully echo him is a perfect little comedy sketch in miniature. It’s jazz as slapstick, a masterclass in turning repetition into pure chaos, and it introduced the song to an entire generation who couldn’t care less about Italian mondo films.
So yes, a tune born in a softcore documentary about randy Scandinavians ended up becoming one of the most beloved children’s songs on Earth. That’s pop culture alchemy for you. From sleazy sauna scene to primetime puppets, ‘Mah Nà Mah Nà’ proves that sometimes the daftest, least likely things have the longest shelf life.