Rachel Bitterman is the main antagonist of the NBC Christmas drama film It's a Very Merry Muppet Christmas Movie.
She was portrayed by Joan Cusack who also played Debbie Jellinsky in Addams Family Values and Mrs Krum in Klaus.
Biography[]
She is a spoiled brat who owns Bitterman Bank and Development (BBAD for short, fittingly enough) after the death of Mr. Bitterman (with whom her relationship is unknown, though it is quite possible she was his wife or daughter), with the implication being that she killed him. In addition to controlling that company, Kermit at one point reveals that she also controls nearly all major media outlets and most of the Internet.
As the film is a parody of It's a Wonderful Life, she is the parody counterpart of Mr. Potter.
Mrs. Bitterman intends to foreclose the Muppet Theater if Kermit doesn't pay her the money the Muppets owe her for it, demolish it, and build a hipster nightclub on its land. She deceptively moves the deadline for payment ahead six hours (From midnight to 6 pm) without giving the Muppets any prior knowledge, and thus the deadline expires and she gains control of the theater via her bank.
In an alternate reality Kermit is shown in which he (Kermit) was never born, we see that Mrs. Bitterman has indeed built the nightclub in the area where the Muppet Theater was meant to stand, and several Muppets are now working for her there, largely under very poor conditions. In addition, we see that in this alternate reality, Mrs. Bitterman annexed a beautiful local park, bulldozed it, and put a shopping mall on its land which comes complete with a large statue of her in the center of it with a plaque that praises her as "Conquering nature, one mall at a time." This seems to indicate that she has almost certainly done the same to other parks and areas of scenic natural beauty.
At the end, when Kermit returns to his normal reality, as he is celebrating being back with his friends, Bitterman shows up to gloat over her imagined victory and force the Muppets out so she can begin tearing down the theater. However, she is foiled by the selfless actions of Pepe the Prawn (Who had previously worked for her briefly, lured both by an attraction to her and by the promise of higher pay, only for him to discover she was just using him to help get her hands on the theater). Pepe reveals that he used the money Bitterman paid him to file a special permit with the city, which caused the Muppet Theater to be officially designated a historical landmark, meaning that while Bitterman technically owns it, she cannot tear it down or change it in any way. Furious at being defeated in this way as the theater is now useless to her, she runs out of the theater, whining and ranting against the Muppets.