HE’S OUT: Elmo puppeteer Kevin Clash resigned yesterday as his “kid-sex” scandal grew more tangled. (Getty Images)
He tickled me, too.
After a second accuser came out against world-renowned puppeteer Kevin Clash, the voice behind the beloved Elmo character abruptly resigned from “Sesame Street” amid salacious allegations that he trolled for sex with underage boys.
Clash, who brought life to the furry red monster for more than 20 years, quit after a Harlem man accused Clash of having sex with him when he was just 15 years old.
“I am resigning from Sesame Workshop with a very heavy heart,” Clash said in a statement.
“I have loved every day of my 28 years working for this exceptional organization. Personal matters have diverted attention away from the important work ‘Sesame Street’ is doing and I cannot allow it to go on any longer. I am deeply sorry to be leaving and am looking forward to resolving these personal matters privately.”
Sesame Workshop, the educational nonprofit that produces the venerable kids show, said Clash’s battle with accusers made it impossible for him to work on the program, according a statement.
“This is a sad day for ‘Sesame Street,’ ” the statement said.
Clash’s sudden downfall came hours after Cecil Singleton, a 24-year-old Harlem student, filed a $5 million lawsuit in Manhattan federal court.
“Kevin Clash was an unmarried adult male living a prominent public life centered around the entertainment of toddlers, while at the same time he was, in secret, preying on teenage boys to satisfy his depraved sexual interests,” the lawsuit says.
In a press conference after Clash’s announcement, Singleton said he decided to go public after another man, Sheldon Stephens, made similar allegations last week.
Stephens has since recanted after reaching a settlement with Clash, but apparently wants a lawyer to help him rip up the agreement so he can go back to his original story.
“Honestly, I put Kevin on a pedestal,” Singleton said. “If I would have known that this was a recurrent thing, or that I wasn’t special and that it wasn’t a unique circumstance, I would have said something much sooner.”
Clash, 52, whose Elmo character went global with the popular “Tickle Me Elmo” doll, met Singleton in 2003 through a gay-phone-chat line where they both lied about their ages.
“I was 15,” Singleton said. “At the time I was unaware of his occupation. Initially, as far as he knew, I was an 18-year-old student and he was a 36-year-old school official who traveled recently out of a relationship.
“After conversing for an hour, he arranged for me to take a cab and meet him at a restaurant not far from his apartment . . . From the moment I arrived, he presented himself as the perfect gentlemen. He told me how beautiful I was and appeared genuinely interested in anything I had to say.I remember confessing to him while we were eating that I wasn’t 18, but that I would be turning 16 in the near future. He told me he wasn’t 36 either.”Singleton said that first date, in 2003, ended with a passionate kiss in Clash’s apartment. He said they met several more times over the next two weeks.
“We had a sexual relationship but we did not have intercourse until years later,” Singleton said. “Groping, masturbation, just a lot of intense kissing, touching, that kind of thing, dry-humping.”
Years later, Singleton said, he had regrets.
“It has occurred to me as an adult how truly inappropriate my relationship with Kevin was,” Singleton said.
Additional reporting by Bruce Golding