Bret McKenzie plans to use his new Oscar winner status to get his way with his Flight of the Conchords partner Jemaine Clement.
The New Zealander won an Oscar today for best original song for Man or Muppet, composed for The Muppets film.
Will Ferrell and Zach Galifianakis presented McKenzie with the award, and as he took to the stage, McKenzie said "I grew up in New Zealand watching the Muppets on TV, never dreamed I'd get to work with them."
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He also joked that working with Kermit the Frog is an honour.
"I was genuinely star-struck when I finally met Kermit the Frog. But once you get to know him, he's just a normal frog, and like many stars here tonight, he's a lot shorter in real-life."
Post his golden statue win, McKenzie continued the jokes backstage when asked by a reporter how he found writing the award winning song without Clement.
"It seems to have gone very well (without Jemaine)," McKenzie laughed.
"But I'm looking forward to writing with Jemaine in the future... because I can pull out the Oscar car and say 'Aaaah, I think we should use this chord and I won an Oscar so...' anyway, yeah."
McKenzie composed a number of songs for The Muppets film, as well as being music director. Man or Muppet was sung by actor Jason Segel.
The Kiwi star won out over Real in Rio by Sergio Mendes and Carlinhos Brown from the film Rio.
But McKenzie admitted that there was a lot of pressure to live up to classic Muppets tunes, such as The Rainbow Connection, made famous on the show.
"When I got the job of working on the film, a friend of mine said 'you'll never write another Rainbow Connection' and I said 'you're right' and I didn't. And it's an honour to get this because Rainbow Connection didn't win an Oscar but there's no doubt that that song is an absolute timeless classic and this is nothing in comparison."
"Everyone did a great job"
Questioned on his win, the Conchord star commended his team.
"To be honest I think it was one of those musical numbers where everyone did a great job - James Bobin, the director did such a cool video, Jason Segel just channelled his... I don't know, he went really deep in his performance both in his recording and on screen and yeah, it just felt like one of those things that fell into place very easily.
McKenzie also paid homage to The Muppets creator Jim Henson.
"In the 80s when I was home a lot watching TV, my dad one day brought home a video recorder and that was the latest thing - he had been to America and came back with a video recorder - no-one else had one. It was pretty exciting - but he only had two video cassettes and one was The Dark Crystal so my brother and I watched that movie at least twice a week, I guess for about 5 years so definitely Jim Henson influenced me and I think he's a huge inspiration.
"The other thing I love about the guy is that he made children's films that I think he found funny, because he was making them for adults. He didn't patronise the minds of children."
McKenzie's Life's a Happy Song won best song at the 2012 Critics' Choice Movie Awards earlier this year. Man or Muppet was also nominated against music from Elton John, Lady Gaga and Mary J Blige.
McKenzie's family gathered to toast his Oscar triumph at Miramar's Roxy Cinema in Wellington.
The Kiwi star's father Peter McKenzie said he was "very, very, very proud" of his son, and that it has been an exciting day.
"We're very confident it would happen, but then you don't know. It's a bit like a horse races, isn't it?"
Brother Justin said McKenzie told ONE News tonight that McKenzy was "very excited about working on the film the moment he got offered the opportunity - so it's (the win) pretty cool, sort of a fulfilment for him - which is nice."
The McKenzies have not spoken to Bret yet but hope to tomorrow once he has finished celebrating.
Other Kiwi Oscar nominees included first timer Dan Barrett, from Weta Digital, along with Joe Letteri, Dan Lemmon, and R Christopher White, whom were nominated for special effects work on Rise of the Planet of the Apes, but lost out to the most nominated film this year - Hugo.
- With Reuters