The former star of a beloved children’s show survived the rumors of his own demise and then found a new home on social media. He is still ready to listen.
Let’s get one thing out of the way: Steve Burns is alive and well. He did not die a tragic and mysterious death in the early 2000s, as some have falsely claimed online. Steve Burns is doing just fine.
You probably know him simply by his first name, which is how he introduced himself to countless children and adults as the star and host of the Nickelodeon children’s television show “Blue’s Clues” from 1996 to 2002. After his departure from the show, rumors of Mr. Burns’s death swirled and followed him for years. (In reality, he was, among other things, working with the Flaming Lips.)
That was finally put to rest a few years ago when he re-emerged on social media. These days, Mr. Burns, now 50, can be found in the Catskills region of New York, where he lives a quieter life and finds time to make the occasional TikTok — a recent video in which Mr. Burns simply sat and pretended to listen to his viewers was particularly popular — for his nearly three million followers.
This interview has been edited and condensed.
Hi, Steve. Where are you picking up this phone call?
I am technically off-grid up a little mountain in the Catskills full time. I was in New York City for more than half my life, but I left to live up here.
When you say you’re “technically off-grid,” how off-grid are we talking?
I harvest all of my own photons every day, so I’m not connected to the electrical grid in any way. I’m not like, you know, sustenance living up here. There’s a supermarket 15 minutes away. I actually wish that I was a little more remote than I am.
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