On Sesame Street, he performed the horns-up half of the Two-Headed Monster alongside Nelson, as well as Sully, Gladys the Cow, Forgetful Jones and Don Music, as well as Elmo for a brief period before Hunt, hating performing the character, tossed the puppet to Kevin Clash. On Fraggle Rock, Hunt was the performer for Gunge and was the voice and facial operator for Junior Gorg, among other roles. Outside the Muppets, Hunt had small acting roles in Trading Places and Oxford Blues (the latter as a result of his Odd Friendship with the film's star Rob Lowe)
Hunt, the first openly gay Muppet performer, died of AIDS-related complications in 1992. The Muppet Christmas Carol was dedicated to the memory of him and Jim Henson, who had died in 1990. While some of his characters like Beaker, Statler, and Sweetums were recast immediately, others took years (Janice, Scooter, Junior Gorg, and even most of his Sesame Street characters), and several were never given a new performer. Incidentally, Scooter's first appearance after his passing was in Muppets From Space where he was voiced by his brother Adam (who was one of the performers in the final scene of The Muppet Movie and also voiced Richard's head of the Two-Headed Monster in a Sesame Street computer game, Let's Make a Word!).
Tropes related to Richard Hunt include:
- Cross-Dressing Voices: Most famously as Janice, but he also split the role of Miss Piggy with Frank Oz on the first season of The Muppet Show.