Visitors to the summer 2003 California State Fair had a surprise in store, when they toured the
display of state counties. A certain world-famous beagle was all over the Sonoma County exhibit, as shown
in this photo. Aside from several plush beagles, you also can see the architectural mock-up of the Charles
M. Schulz Museum, in the center left (under glass, with a floppy plush Snoopy resting atop). Way to go, Sonoma!
(Photo by Wayne Tilcock/The Davis Enterprise)
These articles are arranged from the most recent down, so you'll always find the newest news about Charlie Brown and his friends toward the top; older articles will be located further down, or on previous pages.
Working for 'Peanuts'
January 6, 2004
By Pamela Gibson
The [Sonoma, California] Index-Tribune
At one time, Victor Paddock dreamed of dancing through musical
comedies, repeating memorable lines in famous stage shows and perhaps
even making it to Broadway.
But life moved the Temelec resident in a different direction.
Despite his talent and his drive, he found he had greater skill as a
director — not of theatrical performances or motion pictures but of
special events, nonprofit organizations and people.
Today the 66-year-old works part-time as the volunteer coordinator
of the Charles M. Schulz Museum in Santa Rosa. And this is his new love.
"I found out about the Schulz Museum through a friend, who knew the
director there," said Paddock. "I had one interview with the director
and with Jeannie Schulz. I think they liked my experience and the fact I
was older. Most of their volunteers are older."
The museum opened a year ago August. Volunteers lead tours, monitor
galleries, greet people and help run the hands-on programs.
"They go through some initial training, but most of it is learned
on the job," said Paddock.
He once had 300 volunteers to supervise, but it is now down to 180.
The group he has is loyal and committed. While they come from all
over the county, many are from Sonoma Valley.
"We have an informal contract. My job is to make the work enjoyable
and their job is to show up. It's as simple as that."
Paddock describes the museum as a truly fun place to work. This
atmosphere embodies the spirit of Charles Schulz, whom he described as a
"humble, down-to-earth guy who went out of his way to accommodate
people."
"I never met him, but many on the staff did, and they say that this
is why the museum is less formal, that there are exhibits that people
can touch, even though there are also priceless collections in the
place."
Although he trained in theater arts at the University of California
at Los Angeles, where he studied with Francis Ford Coppola, George Takei
of Star Trek fame and actor Tom Skerritt, Paddock is no stranger to
museums. While working through his degree programs he took a job with
the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and worked there after graduation,
becoming head of the special events department.
"I spent 13 years there and was in charge of theater events,
receptions, cashiers and various helpers," he said. "I love art and
artists, and this was a very special introduction to the museum field
for me."
In 1976 Paddock married his wife, Saundra, and four years later
they moved to Medford, Ore., a community they chose based on it being "a
nice place to raise a family."
Their son, Gary, was born there, and Paddock worked at the Rogue
Gallery, an offshoot of the Rogue Valley Art Association. But they
missed California and soon found themselves in St. Helena, where Paddock
became the manager of a new art gallery. A few years later he landed the
job as head of the Napa Valley Museum, also in St. Helena at the time.
"The Napa museum was started in the '70s and was located in the old
high school in St. Helena," said Paddock. "It featured exhibits on art,
history, ephemera and science as it related to the wine industry. While
I was there we raised enough funds to relocate to a new building on the
grounds of the Veterans Home in Yountville. Now funds are being raised
to build additional buildings, either there or in another location."
Paddock spent 13 years in this job, before retiring in 2002. During
his tenure, he went back to school and obtained a second master's degree
in museum studies from John F. Kennedy University in Orinda.
And though he had officially retired, he knew it was only a matter
of time before he became involved in a museum somewhere.
"I love people," he said. "Those who work at museums are a
fascinating bunch. It's the people who kept me in the business."
It was people who drew him back to the business at the Schulz
Museum.
"I've worked with volunteers for most of my career," he said. "I
couldn't pass up the opportunity to work with them again."
Because his wife works in Napa, the couple moved to the Temelec
senior community in the south end of the Sonoma Valley last spring, an
easy commute for both of them. They have since added to their family — a
cat, Baby, and a beagle in honor of Snoopy, who is called Petie.
"Petie is the newest addition, and I have to tell you that I've
lost five pounds since we got him, just taking him out for his daily
exercise."
Paddock and his family have become fond of Sonoma Valley and find
the people initially friendlier than 'the other valley.'"
"There are great people in both valleys, but people in Napa tend to
be a little more reserved," he said. "Not so in Sonoma. People say hello
to you, even if they don't know you."
Paddock's job is four days a week, so he has a chance to enjoy the
community. He is always looking for volunteers and hopes to make the
rounds of service clubs talking about the joys of working at the Schulz
Museum.
Does he ever regret not continuing his early career as a
professional actor and dancer?
"I confess, I took dance originally to fulfill a physical education
requirement," he said. "But I was able to appear in many local
productions from musicals to melodramas, with a little summer stock
thrown in, and that was enough."
"I'm very happy to be working at the Schulz Museum now," he said.
"Charles Schulz touched a lot of people in this county and people want
to give back.
"I'm one of them."
It's a Very Merry Revival, Charlie Brown
December 24, 2003
By Kris Maher
The Wall Street Journal
Earlier this month, Dia Guaraldi was watching the lighting of a big
outdoor Christmas tree in San Francisco when she heard a familiar
holiday tune broadcast over the crowd of shoppers.
The jazzy piano music from the soundtrack to the animated feature A
Charlie Brown Christmas made her tingle with pride because her father
Vince Guaraldi had composed the tune. "At Christmastime, it's everywhere
you go," says Ms. Guaraldi. She says she has lost track of how many
times she has heard it on the radio in the past month or so.
Thirty-eight years after the first TV broadcast of the half-hour
Christmas special in which a depressed Charlie Brown seeks the true
meaning of the holiday, the music from the cartoon is becoming more
pervasive than ever. Every December, songs from the soundtrack are
played in bookstores and department stores, by pops orchestras and local
jazz bands. Modtones, a company that sells song samples for cell phones,
says one tune from the record is among the top ten choices of holiday
songs this year as a ring tone.
The album, which is also titled "A Charlie Brown Christmas," has
sold a million copies in the last six years — as much as in the previous
30 — with sales increasing incrementally each year, according to Fantasy
Inc., the small jazz label based in Berkeley, Calif., that produces the
record.
The album has also continued to rank high on the holiday charts,
where it is No. 21, behind mostly new or recent releases. "In the early
'90s, it was selling very well, but now it's selling even better," says
Keith Caulfield, a chart manager for Billboard Magazine. "I have no idea
why it's doing so well, aside from the fact that it's one of the
all-time Christmas albums."
This doesn't take into account sales of the slightly different CD
version that Starbucks Corp. has been selling in its coffee shops for
seven years — the only one of its records that has been popular enough
to bring back each year during the holidays, the company says.
Some say the album has done so well because the music has by now
lodged itself in the consciousness of several generations. Several songs
for Peanuts specials, including "Linus & Lucy" from the Christmas album,
have attained the status of standards in recent years as well-known
musicians, such as trumpeter Wynton Marsalis and pianists George Winston
and David Benoit, have recorded their own versions. Some songs have also
been embraced by music scholars, who point to the melancholy "Christmas
Time is Here" as reflective of the doubt-tinged contemporary cultural
mood.
Other songs, like the more upbeat "Linus & Lucy," are quick to
bring a smile to the listener's face. "That little bouncy theme is the
best original Christmas composition in the last fifty years that I know
of," says William E. Studwell, retired professor from Northern Illinois
University, in De Kalb, Ill., and author of "The Christmas Carol
Reader." "It's subtle and underplayed. It's not `Joy to the World.'"
For many baby boomers, the unmistakably meditative music has the
power to ferry them back to the remembered glow of a TV set and what
seems to have been a simpler holiday season.
Many fans of the music are like Derrick Bang, who can vividly
recall sitting in front of his parents' black-and-white set when he was
10 years old and eating Christmas cookies as he watched the program.
"The music was magical," says Mr. Bang, who has been an ardent fan of
Charles Schulz and of Mr. Guaraldi ever since. "If you nailed me to the
wall I might even be able to tell you what I was wearing," he says.
Mr. Bang, who is 48 years old and now entertainment editor for the
Davis Enterprise, a Davis, Calif., newspaper, wrote a book on Charles
Schulz, "50 Years of Happiness A Tribute to Charles M. Schulz." For the
past 38 years, he has watched A Charlie Brown Christmas on TV, with the
exception of one year during college when he couldn't get to a set in
time. Today, when he reads Peanuts comic strips, he says, "I hear that
Peanuts music in my head. It's part of the experience."
Dia and her brother David are the chief beneficiaries of the
continuing popularity of their father's music. David estimates that the
two have received about $1 million in royalties in the past ten years.
David, 48, is the primary caretaker of the Vince Guaraldi legacy, and he
works at it full time. In August, he brought out a new album called "The
Charlie Brown Suite & Other Favorites," from unreleased recordings. In
January, he plans to release another album of his father's music.
Vince Guaraldi, a short, stocky man with a flamboyant mustache that
became a trademark around the San Francisco jazz scene where he mostly
performed, had known success prior to the Peanuts. In 1962, he won a
Grammy award for best original jazz composition for "Cast Your Fate to
the Wind." He died in 1976 at age 47 at the height of his fame.
The ongoing popularity of the Christmas music has been a shock to
David. "It just blew my mind to see how many people want this album for
Christmas," he says. Last year, his royalty check for the period that
includes holiday sales nearly doubled. In some ways, the success of this
Christmas music in particular is bittersweet, he says, because his
father, a driven musician who was also difficult to get to know, has
been gone for so long.
But he holds fast to the same music that returns many other adults
to happy childhood memories, because it is the most enduring link he has
to his father. "It pretty much keeps me and my family going," he says.
"That's what I always know that I'll have."
Spanish Charlie Brown play takes stage
December 23, 2003
By Kathleen D. Bailey
The Exeter [New Hampshire] News-Letter
EXETER — Parents, friends and the odd reporter waited outside the
Exeter High School Science Lecture Hall for a play, A Charlie Brown
Christmas, by the students in Spanish classes. As the students went back
and forth, fetching props and scripts, one boy was noticeable for his
smudgy face and soiled clothing. He looked like a younger child who had
been playing in the mud. "That's Pig Pen," one of the spectators said
confidently.
Not too shabby when not one word had been spoken, in either Spanish
or English.
The Spanish students at Exeter High School presented a free
performance of Charlie Brown, in Spanish, this past Thursday afternoon.
Though the words weren't always understandable to the audience, the
meaning was obvious as Charles Schulz's beloved characters went through
their Christmas shenanigans.
The props were simple a miniature mailbox for the cards Charlie
doesn't get, a child's toy piano for Schroeder, and a desk for Lucy's
psychiatrist's office. The biggest prop was a cardboard dog house for
Snoopy; the funniest, a mangled Christmas tree.
Steven Briden played Carlitos, the hapless Charlie Brown. Ana
Caguiat was Lucy, whose "crabbiness" transcended language. Laura Keir,
as Sally Brown, harassed her brother in Spanish about her letter to
Santa and her request for "tens and twenties."
When Lucy walked in to the play rehearsal to introduce Charlie
Brown as the new director, the students were doing the same manic dance
the cartoon characters do at that point, and seemed to have as much fun.
And when Lucy drilled Snoopy on how to be a sheep in the Christmas
pageant, Anne Krane, as the imaginative canine, had the same trouble as
her cartoon counterpart in saying "Baah."
The students were smooth enough to deliver their lines well, and
get into character, but they were loose enough to have fun with the
play.
They were loose enough to improvise. When Ben Gordon, the only
Jewish student on the project, was asked by Charlie Brown where to find
the spirit of Christmas, Gordon said in Spanish that he didn't know
about the spirit of Christmas, but he would be happy to help Charlie
find the spirit of Hanukkah. (Hint That's not in the original script.)
"I improvised a lot," Gordon said after the show.
When Lucy harassed Charlie Brown about some point, Briden sighed,
"Las mujeres," or "Women!," with the world-weary look that's the same of
any male in any language.
And when Charlie finally settled on his pathetic tree, his "No
importa" (loosely translated It's OK) transcended language.
Charlie wandered through the audience, looking for the spirit of
Christmas. Spanish teacher Linda Beaton finally told him, "Nino Jesus."
The other kids showed him his reborn tree, and the production ended with
a rousing rendition of "Feliz Navidad."
Student EB Meade directed the production. "I directed them mostly
in English," she said, "but a couple of Spanish phrases crept in. For
example, I'd yell 'Escuchen' or 'listen' when I wanted their attention.
I guess you could call it Spanglish."
She had more work to do with some than others, especially on
pronunciation. Ana Caguiat lived in Spain as a child, so her
pronunciation was good, while others had only taken it in school.
Teacher Senora Michelle Marnicio adapted the script from a book, A
Charlie Brown Christmas, in Spanish, Meade said.
Meade, a junior, said the play was difficult to get done by
Christmas because of all the other activities, and because most of her
classmates are also in drama, and drama was working on productions at
the same time. She wants to do another play in Spanish, perhaps in the
spring or next year.
Other students in the production were Matt Prior, Jeff Lambert,
Jenny Long, Joseph Kiesel, Sarah Friedman and Nicole Urbanowski. Teacher
Linda Beaton coordinated the refreshments, and Amy Keir designed the
program.
As Charlie would say, Feliz Navidad y un prospero ano!
Fairview Heights man is nutty for Peanuts
December 22, 2003
By Michelle Meehan
STLToday.com [St. Louis Today]
It's Christmas, Charlie Brown. But instead of a raggedy Charlie
Brown Christmas tree, Johnny Lanctot displays an artificial pine in his
living room in Fairview Heights.
Not to worry. He still bought it for "peanuts."
Snoopy fighting the Red Baron. Lucy doling out advice for a nickel
a pop. A fan of the late cartoonist Charles Schulz, Lanctot has
decorated his Christmas tree with dozens of Peanuts ornaments.
That way, it matches the rest of his home.
Peanuts memorabilia lines the fireplace mantle, and a lithograph of
Snoopy hangs above the couch. Precious Peanuts figurines are perched in
shadow boxes. And Peanuts clothing items — ranging from Charlie Brown
sweatshirts to Snoopy neckties — fill the bedroom closet.
"When I first met my wife, Theresa, she had a lot of the Peanuts
books," recalled Lanctot, 45. "That was back in the '70s. Since I knew
she liked Snoopy, every Christmas or birthday, I'd get her Peanuts
things."
Eventually, Lanctot took over his wife's collection, joining the
Peanuts Collector Club and bonding with other Peanuts aficionados over
the Internet. He now buys and sells Peanuts items on eBay.
"I'm a lucky man," mused Lanctot, who serves as director of
transportation for Southwestern Illinois College when he's not adding to
his collection. "My wife generally is supportive of my addiction. Of
course, it helps that she likes the characters too."
Q You caught the Peanuts bug from your wife. When did she fall in
love with Charlie Brown and Snoopy?
A She wrote the publisher of the Peanuts books when she was a
little girl and asked for a complete listing of the books by Charles
Schulz. She wanted to get them all.
Q Are your two sons also Peanuts collectors?
A No. Thomas is 8, and he likes them OK, but he prefers Yu -Gi-Oh!
Our son Jon plays the saxophone. He's 16. He recently went to a high
school dance, and he wore a necktie decorated with Snoopy playing the
saxophone.
Q So there's hope?
A You never know.
Q What's your favorite Peanuts character?
A The flying ace is my favorite character. Snoopy had many
personas. I actually give a talk to different groups about Peanuts and
how Charles Schulz influenced America.
Q Other than eBay, where do you find Peanuts Christmas ornaments?
A I find them in antique shops and at flea markets. Some of them I
got when they first came out, which is the best way to get them.
Q Are they cheaper that way?
A Yes, they are. It can get expensive. Forbes magazine had an
article on the highest-grossing deceased celebrities. Elvis was No. 1,
and Charles Schulz was No. 2.
Q You've probably helped with his rating. How much does a typical
Peanuts Christmas ornament go for?
A My ornaments range in price from $2 to all the way up to $100.
Q Do you also collect Schulz's comic strips?
A I like comics in general. But I like Schulz the most. I have one
of his original strips. If I had to rate in order, I like his books,
followed by the art, followed by the Christmas stuff.
Q And you have it all, don't you?
A Pretty much. I have Peanuts toys, music boxes, figurines,
Christmas ornaments, posters, clothing.
Q What's the rarest item in your collection?
A The rarest item is actually a book. For some reason, the last
book in the series didn't get published much. It had a low run. It took
me years to find it. But the nice thing about it was — when I finally
did — it was autographed by Schulz.
Q And the highlight of your collecting career?
A In the year 2000, a Japanese public service station — the
equivalent of our PBS — did a special on Charles Schulz. My family was
featured as a typical family in America who was influenced by Schulz. I
was told it was seen by 44 million Japanese. After it ran, I even got a
few letters from people in Japan who saw it.
Nothing new under the tree
December 17, 2003
New York Daily News
When it comes to Christmas TV specials, they sure don't make them
like they used to.
And most of the time, for various reasons, they're not even trying.
The WB tonight at 8 airs How the Grinch Stole Christmas, a charming
animated version of the Dr. Seuss tale, which was narrated by Boris
Karloff and made in 1966.
Earlier this month, ABC presented twice A Charlie Brown Christmas,
a Charles M. Schulz special from 1965. The first telecast, in its
opening half hour, beat four of the other five networks in overall
audience levels, and beat them with the advertiser coveted 18 to 49
year-old viewers.
Earlier this month, the Cartoon Network revived a long-dormant
family holiday cartoon, 1962's Mr. Magoo's Christmas Carol, and is
repeating it Tuesday at 11 a.m.
My column on its return to TV sparked a flurry of grateful e-mails,
all talking about how they remembered watching the show when they were
young, and how they would share it with their children.
That's three terrific holiday specials, all made in the early
1960s.
Is there anything comparable being made today? Are today's kids
getting the opportunity to build their own TV memories of Christmas
specials made for them? And if not, why not?
Forty years from now, will today's youngsters look back fondly to,
say, the reindeer-testicle-eating holiday edition of Fear Factor? NBC
liked last year's episode enough to repeat it this week as a Christmas
special, with the reindeer parts being washed down by 100-year-old
eggnog.
I'd root for NBC to get a lump of coal in its stocking this year,
but the network probably would just make some "Fear Factor" contestant
eat it.
There have been a few solid holiday shows in recent years, ones
that are good bets to stand the test of time. Nickelodeon's "Rugrats"
Hanukkah special from 1996, repeated tonight, is a perennial, and 1999's
Olive, the Other Reindeer, first shown on Fox, is a sweet family story
in the grand holiday tradition.
On the rude side, there's the entertaining impertinence of Comedy
Central's "South Park" holiday episodes. Also, there's the occasional
new holiday telemovie, like last Sunday's Secret Santa on NBC and the
previous Sunday's Undercover Christmas on CBS.
But the networks aren't making as many telemovies these days. Even
great ones from previous years, like George C. Scott in the CBS version
of A Christmas Carol from 1984, are hard, if not impossible, to find.
Nor are variety shows and specials as plentiful as they were a
generation or two ago. These days, instead of Andy Williams or Bob Hope
holding court for the holidays, we get, courtesy of MTV, Ozzy Osbourne.
The truth is, they aren't making TV Christmas specials like they
used to because, as families, we're not watching TV like we used to. Not
in front of the same set, with everyone gathered around to watch Snoopy
dance or Tiny Tim sing.
The way something becomes a TV tradition these days, like TNT's
annual showing of the charming 1983 movie A Christmas Story, is through
saturation — showing it nonstop for 24 hours, every year, until it finds
and builds an audience.
Not that I'm asking for 24 hours of "Fear Factor" or Ozzy Osbourne.
But nothing's come down the pike to equal A Charlie Brown Christmas or
Mr. Magoo's Christmas Carol, much less threaten to knock it out of the
holiday rotation.
'Tis the season to go see a beagle on skates
'Merry Christmas, Snoopy' proves entertainment value of an annual
institution
December 14, 2003
By Debra D. Bass
The Santa Rosa Press Democrat
It's impossible to hate a Christmas show and retain your humanity.
So run, don't walk, bring a kid, bring a friend, bring a friend's kid to
see "Merry Christmas, Snoopy."
Religious considerations aside, it just wouldn't be the holidays if
it weren't for an abundance of Christmas cliche, forced smiles and a few
slightly inappropriate bits of innuendo.
At a time when staid holiday fare is at a peak because people will
see just about anything invoking the name of Christmas, Snoopy's
Christmas show manages to not only uphold tradition but retain its
entertainment value.
For the 18th year, the show entices audiences with a wide-ranging
performance that swings from the African Serengeti to Paris' Moulin
Rouge in the span of an intermission.
Like a madman with a record collection, the scenes occasionally
skid from one sporadic element to the next and the result is usually
endearing. In an Elton John sequence, a lost-love blues song precedes a
raucous Saturday night party song and dovetails into a testament to
human frailty.
Special guest stars Eric Millot and skating pair Ellicia Shepard
and Matthew Evers add stability to the fray with solo and duet
performances that will touch ice skating fans.
Millot, a four-time French National Champion, ably executes a few
backflip homages to the Redwood Ice Arena icon Skippy Baxter. He also
riles up the crowd with a rocking Rolling Stones lip-synching medley
that is kitschy and slightly embarrassing, like all good lip-sync.
Shepard and Evers are sincere and graceful in a series of
performances, including a number of wistful turns and a few daring holds
during "I Guess That's Why They Call It The Blues."
And for the contingent that wouldn't otherwise be caught dead
watching people glide around leaping and balancing on thin blades,
there's enough action and movement to keep eyes from glazing over.
Choreographer and director Karen Kresge Titolo maintains a swirl of
activity that only occasionally mimics a crowded ice rink. When a troupe
of nearly 30 performers is navigating a smallish arena at the same time,
the goal is not finesse, but staying out of each other's way.
Costume designer Jennifer Langeberg steals the show during the
Serengeti sequence and toy-store finale. Masked skaters embody antelopes
running alongside zebras and leopards in one and dolls come to life in
the other.
And they don't get top billing, but hanging from the ceiling,
suspended by their own body weight and folds of fabric, Chau Pham and
Ivan Flores provided the most thrills.
The duo exhibited strength and dexterity, and a bit of Cirque du
Soleil flair, that can only be hinted at by a climactic move in which
the petite Pham was executing a leg split upside-down holding Flores by
one-hand while he was arched and also posed.
Soloist Jeff Bonefant also performs an engaging aerial act, when
he's not joining the ice-side tumblers energizing the action with
explosive flips.
The ensemble of familiar faces and smiling pros is a nice backdrop.
Each act begins with a sample of Christmas carols from a small
group from the Santa Rosa Children's Chorus to put everyone in the
proper mood.
And the family Christmas treat just wouldn't be complete without
Judy Sladky as Snoopy.
Viewers see red over Charlie Brown ads
December 12, 2003
David Bianculli
The New York Daily News
Looks like I wasn't the only one astounded by ABC's ridiculous
inclusion of a pair of slimy Trista and Ryan's Wedding
bachelor-party promos during the network's telecast of the G-rated A
Charlie Brown Christmas family cartoon classic.
Based on the E-mail I received, many viewers were just as incensed
at the stupidity of ABC executives as I was.
"I was outraged to see the sleazy promos for that stupid wedding
show," wrote Diane Morgan of Cincinnati. "I have watched this holiday
program for 30 years, and for the last five have had my daughter watch
with me. Being a responsible parent, my family watches only small
amounts of television because of the terrible viewing choices. You were
completely right in your comments in your article. Never would I have
imagined that shots of a bachelor party would be shown during this
program."
Dennis O'Brien of Rochester, N.Y., who said he has worked in
television for more than 20 years, said he has seen a steady decline in
taste and common sense in the pursuit of profit.
"There are too many examples of corporate pea-brains who pull a
stunt like putting those promos in Peanuts and then just shake their
hollow heads in disbelief, wring their sweating hands and make an empty
promise to 'find out who's responsible for this obvious mistake,' "
O'Brien wrote, "and then go full-speed ahead to their next date with
disaster.
"They're spineless, thoughtless, greedy goofballs who don't dare do
anything but follow orders," he added. "I've worked on news,
newsmagazines, tabloid shows, judge shows, talk shows, dating shows and
blah, blah, woof, woof, and I'm sure I've committed many crimes of
questionable taste, too. But I would hope that if I'm ever confronted
with a glaringly simple choice as 'Peanuts' certainly was, I would not
stand by silently and work out the promo sked with the traffic
department."
O'Brien admitted it's easy to "get numb and number" when working in
the trenches, but every once in a while "a grenade goes off," making one
think about what's happening.
On perhaps a positive note, ABC is rerunning A Charlie Brown
Christmas tomorrow night at 8. The wedding is over, so we know for
sure there won't be any bachelor-party strippers.
Let's see if ABC executives can find another way to wreck this one.
Christmastime is here
Peanuts, 'Wonderful Life' offer true cheer
December 11, 2003
By Todd Leopold
CNN
The Christmas sales have been going on since Halloween. The actual
holiday isn't due for another two weeks. But as far as I'm concerned,
this weekend really kicks off the Christmas season.
A Charlie Brown Christmas and It's a Wonderful Life
are back.
Few programs -- and, despite Wonderful Life's film pedigree, it was
only through endless showings on television that it really became a
cultural touchstone -- have expressed the hopes and spirit of the season
so well.
Both have genuine moments of despair. Whose heart doesn't sink when
Charlie Brown puts the ornament on the little tree, and then -- watching
it perilously bend -- cries, "I killed it!" Who doesn't weep when Jimmy
Stewart, as George Bailey, hears from Clarence that Mary is "an old
maid"?
And who doesn't fill with joy when the Peanuts gang fixes up the
little tree and starts singing, or Stewart goes tearing through Bedford
Falls, cheering how much he loves his stupid little town?
Only network execs could be so Grinch-ly, and maybe they are Both
programs are on at the same time, Saturday at 8 p.m. -- Charlie
Brown on ABC, and It's a Wonderful Life on NBC.
Eye on Entertainment rolls his retinas and sets his VCR.
Eye-opener
It's a shame, really, that both specials are competing against each
other. Though both have been available on video for years, there's
something about gathering around our modern fireplaces and watching them
when they're scheduled.
We should feel lucky that both exist at all. Both programs could
have vanished into the entertainment ether.
A Charlie Brown Christmas was no sure thing. When it
premiered in 1965, CBS -- its original network -- had great concerns
over its content. Why, it's got a jazz score!
Linus reads a Bible verse! Charles Schulz's message (and that of
co-creators Bill Melendez and Lee Mendelson) was anti-commercial! That
must have made the marketing folks feel good.
Worse, even though the show was a hit, over the years the network
played games with it -- trimming a few frames to fit in yet another
commercial. Network execs have little appreciation of irony, obviously.
(No word on whether ABC is going to do the same thing.)
It's a Wonderful Life wasn't a huge hit when it came out in
1946. The movie earned decent box office and mixed reviews, but the big
movie story that year was The Best Years of Our Lives, which went
on to win best picture. (Wonderful Life was nominated for five
Oscars and didn't win any.)
Indeed, the movie -- so associated with Christmas -- almost came
out in January. It was only because RKO's original holiday feature
wasn't ready that the release date was moved up.
Television saved the movie, as it was endlessly syndicated and soon
became ubiquitous in December. Now we all know how George lassos the
moon and wins the heart of Mary (Donna Reed), how that idiot Uncle Billy
can't remember what he did with thousands of dollars, and all about the
evil Mr. Potter (Lionel Barrymore).
And, if you're like me, you'll be learning it all over again
Saturday night.
Good Grief! Clueless network executives almost killed A Charlie
Brown Christmas nearly 40 years ago
December 11, 2003
By Andrew McGinn
The Springfield News-Sun
It wasn't like Pig Pen was going to speak in tongues.
But nearly four decades ago, the network executives still deemed
A Charlie Brown Christmas too religious for TV.
Not to mention just too boring. After all, there was no laugh
track, real kids did the voices and there was too much, gasp,
contemporary jazz in it.
Cartoonist Charles M. Schulz -- known as Sparky to those around him
-- knew it would work.
It did. Won an Emmy, too. Now it has the nifty distinction of being
the longest-running cartoon special known to man.
And beagles.
A Charlie Brown Christmas, along with Charlie Brown
Christmas Tales, airs once again at 8 p.m. Saturday on ABC.
"Sparky seemed to instinctively feel the audience reaction,"
recalled Bill Melendez, 87, the animator who has produced all 50 Peanuts
specials to grace the tube. "He asked me how I felt about faith. I'm not
religious at all. In fact, I'm suspicious of it. But he was very loyal
to his Christian religion. And he wasn't a pain in the neck about it. He
was just sensible."
That kind of sensibility translated into a genuine TV moment on
Dec. 9, 1965. And, so far, every year since.
"It's a very gentle, soft-spoken message. But it doesn't push
anything," Melendez explained from his office near L.A.
The special examines, through the eyes of some incredibly wise
6-year-olds, the meaning of Christmas.
Ever the ulcer candidate, Charlie Brown, who should probably ask
his doctor about prescription Zoloft, is down and out once again. This
time, he worries that Christmas has gone too commercial. But what's a
blockhead to do?
Lucy suggests he direct the school Christmas pageant. Don't get any
wise ideas, kids. The ACLU will snatch your halo.
But nobody takes poor Chuck seriously. Especially not when he goes
and picks out a runt of a Christmas tree.
"Somebody once said Schulz was a bell ringer. He could identify
things everybody went through," explained Lee Mendelson, the 70-year-old
television producer who has teamed with Melendez for every Peanuts
special since '65.
Enter Linus, who trades his blanket for the King James Bible and reads
us the true meaning of Christmas straight up.
Direct passages from the good book? In the end, they're what give
A Charlie Brown Christmas its heart and soul.
But it wasn't without debate. The original network, CBS, hated the
religion. Hated the jazz, too. Said they'd air it one time then, oops,
forget it.
Mendelson and Melendez weren't so sure, either.
"I argued with Sparky about it and told him that we'd never done
anything with religion in cartoons," Melendez said.
"He looked at me and said, 'Well, Bill, let's be the first.' "
The whole time, Melendez didn't think the special would fly. And it
wasn't the story, or the jazz, that worried him.
The thing looked "overly underdone," he said. After all, Melendez
had got his start working for Walt Disney in the late 1930s on such
majestic projects as Fantasia. He went on to animate "Looney Tunes"
shorts in the early '40s.
When the '60s rolled around, there he was -- charged with bringing
a crudely drawn newspaper comic strip to life.
Shortly before the special, Melendez had animated Charlie Brown for
a series of commercials for the Ford Motor Co.
A Charlie Brown Christmas, however, was to be the Peanuts
gang's prime-time debut.
"They taught us at Disney to draw it and draw it right," he said.
"I became a student of how Schulz drew. He had a shaky line. I would try
to imitate that, but it didn't work. So I drew it as simple as I could.
That's the beauty of it.
"I hate to look a guy like Sparky in the eye and change his work
into something I feel is better."
Indeed, Melendez took Schulz's popular strip and kept it the same,
simply making it move. And he learned to like it.
"In the early days at Disney, the stuff we were doing wasn't
cartoony enough. There's a beauty in simplicity," he said.
"How can I have been so wrong?"
After A Charlie Brown Christmas, more specials were ordered.
Many became instant classics (It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie
Brown from 1966). Others haven't been heard from again (It's
Arbor Day, Charlie Brown from '76). And some are yet to prove their
worth.
This week ABC aired the 50th prime-time Peanuts special, I Want
a Dog for Christmas, Charlie Brown!.
It's the fourth new special to air since Schulz, who scripted all
of his own specials, died three years ago at age 77.
"I try to make them as close to the spirit as we had in the
beginning. Because I've worked with the characters for so long, I'm in a
great position to stop any nonsense. I should shelter the original
creations. The syndicate and the network think they can just get another
writer. But it's not really the same. I miss my old friend," Melendez
said.
Then again, with each new special, Melendez gets more money. Acting
residuals. He provides Snoopy's voice, too.
"It pays for lunch," he said.
The spirit of Schulz is working for Peanuts in new animated special
December 9, 2003
By Robert Lloyd
The Los Angeles Times
After a slow 10 years in the animated life of the Peanuts gang --
apart from a couple of direct-to-video adventures and a Super
Bowl-themed one-off for NBC, Charlie Brown and his cartoon peers (were
they ever really his pals?) were virtually on hiatus -- ABC last year
set them to work again in new prime-time specials.
The latest edition is I Want a Dog for Christmas, Charlie
Brown, again, as always, the work of director-producer Bill Melendez
(nearing 90 and still the voice of Snoopy) and executive producer Lee
Mendelson, with the music of the late Vince Guaraldi back in place,
albeit here played less swingingly by David Benoit. (The network also
has stewardship over the holiday trifecta of It's the Great Pumpkin,
Charlie Brown, A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving and the half-hour
that started it all, A Charlie Brown Christmas, which airs for
the second time this season on Saturday.)
The presiding spirit is, of course, that of the also-late Charles
Schulz, whose comic strips form the basis of the script. Indeed, the
jokes unroll in four-panel beats, the punch lines often aphoristic, in
that Schulzian way -- "Big sisters are the crabgrass in the lawn of
life," "Younger brothers learn to think fast," "You can talk to the
moon, but the sun won't listen." (Still working that last one out.) The
gags line up like kids in a cafeteria, each saying its piece and moving
on quickly to make room for the next.
The new special focuses on Rerun, the younger brother of Linus and
Lucy -- a character who did not exist when A Charlie Brown
Christmas first aired. (He made his animated debut in the 1976
It's Arbor Day, Charlie Brown -- seriously.) He wants a dog. He
deals with his strange siblings, whom he claims sometimes not to know.
("What would you do if I kicked those over?" Lucy asks of Rerun's
building blocks. "Probably nothing at the moment," he responds, "but
years from now, after you're married, when you and your husband want me
to co-sign a note so you can buy a new house, I'll refuse.")
Charlie Brown is more or less on the sidelines, neither the hero
nor the goat; Linus likewise has little chance to philosophize. Snoopy,
of course, gets a lot of screen time -- he is clearly the most fun, and
easiest, to animate -- and is here joined by his brother Spike, visiting
from Needles. "You're as thin as a promise," Lucy tells Spike, a
wonderfully unexpected metaphor from the mouth of a cartoon
second-grader.
Unlike A Charlie Brown Christmas, it is not a real Christmas
story, though it is full of Christmas decoration and Christmas incident
(snow, shopping, Snoopy dressed as Santa). It is also marginally more
hectic than the former -- a bona fide classic, and a still-fresh and
surprising marvel of concision and quietude, that has screened every
Yuletide since it premiered in 1965 and has therefore colonized the
cerebral cortex of nearly every American younger than 50.
I Want a Dog, etc., by contrast, is merely the latest issue of a
nearly 40-year franchise that includes a Saturday morning series and
four feature films, and if it doesn't aim for quite the spiritual beauty
of that first Christmas special, it is nevertheless a sweet show, with a
nicely handmade look and a homemade feel. As in Peanuts past, the voices
are those of real children, many or all of them amateurs -- they lack
the brutal cheeriness of the professional child actor and the
knowingness of the adult who plays a child.
Big words are not always pronounced correctly, and the stresses in
a line don't always fall in the right place. The jokes sometimes fall
flat, the way they do when kids tell them, and you should understand
that I mean that as a good thing.
Lots of Familiar Punch Lines, Charlie Brown
December 9, 2003
By Anita Gates
The New York Times
Lucy and Linus Van Pelt's younger brother, Rerun, doesn't enjoy
riding on the back of his mother's bicycle. (She's not that great a
driver.) But he tries to keep a cheerful attitude. "Over hill, over
dale," he says brightly. "Poor Dale."
Rerun is the central character in the newest Peanuts television
special, I Want a Dog for Christmas, Charlie Brown!, tonight on
ABC. He should have his agent complain to the producers about his
material.
It's not that I Want a Dog doesn't have a lot of the
bittersweet charm of the Charles M. Schulz newspaper comic strip. (Since
Schulz's death in 2000 it has continued in its own kind of reruns,
"Peanuts Classics.") The problem is that this one-hour film feels like a
hodgepodge of four-frame strips strung together in an unsuccessful
attempt to create a unified story. That may well be exactly the
structure we're dealing with, since Bill Melendez and Lee Mendelson,
Schulz's longtime collaborators, have vowed to create new specials by
working exclusively from the strip.
The plot is supposed to be about Rerun's Christmas wish for his own
dog, since Charlie Brown won't sell his pet, Snoopy, for less than $10
million, and Rerun has only 16 cents. In the beginning Rerun tries to
play with Snoopy a lot, which he figures is the next best thing to dog
ownership. But his play demands become so overwhelming that Snoopy
begins responding to his invitations with form-letter rejections. Then
Snoopy's brother Spike, who lives alone in the Southwest, writes that
he's coming to visit, and Rerun decides he'll adopt Spike upon arrival.
But the plot is easy to lose sight of, as unrelated stories often
separate the dog scenes from one another, and the repeated
one-two-three-punch-line structure gives the show an undesirable
mini-sketch rhythm. Sally, struggling with boots, mittens and zippers,
concludes, "I wasn't made for winter." Next she tries a flight on
Snoopy's Ace Airline and complains, "Hey, I thought that passengers were
always served a nice lunch." That one has to be from a very old strip.
Lucy persists in her attempts to make Schroeder, the piano prodigy,
fall in love with her. He assures her that Beethoven, his idol, never
had women hanging around while he practiced, and more than once
Schroeder gets rid of Lucy by catapulting her off his piano. "Never fall
in love with a musician," she concludes.
Snoopy dresses up as Santa Claus and traumatizes a little girl when
she sees Santa eating from a dog dish. Charlie Brown recalls the time
Snoopy's others brother visited and trashed Snoopy's nicely furnished
doghouse as if they were rock stars. Lucy signs up Rerun to be in the
Christmas play. And the thing ends abruptly with a Charlie Brown comment
on closing credits.
Luckily the individual strips will regain their playful poignancy
when someone takes them apart. We'll still have Rerun at the breakfast
table, bemoaning the three-part fate he has just realized. "How could
anyone not have a dog or a trust fund or grape jelly?"
I Want a Dog for Christmas, Charlie Brown!
ABC, tonight at 8, Eastern and Pacific times; 7, Central time
Created by Charles M. Schulz; directed by Bill Melendez and Larry
Leichliter; produced by Mr. Melendez; Lee Mendelson, executive producer;
edited by Warren Taylor. Music by Vince Guaraldi and David Benoit,
arranged and performed by Mr. Benoit. Animation by Eddy Houchins, Shawn
Cashman and David Brain.
WITH THE VOICES OF Jimmy Bennett (Rerun), Adam Taylor Gordon
(Charlie Brown), Ashley Rose Orr (Lucy), Corey Padnos (Linus), Hannah
Leigh Dworkin (Sally), Nick Price (Schroeder), Jake Miner (Pig Pen and
Franklin), Kaitlyn Maggio (little girl) and Bill Melendez
(Snoopy).
Charlie Brown Gets Some Christmas Company
December 8, 2003
By Jay Bobbin
tv.zap2it.com
It's not unusual to see the Peanuts gang celebrating Christmas, but
this year, they're spreading extra cheer.
Not only are Charles M. Schulz's beloved characters on view in the
classic cartoon "A Charlie Brown Christmas" — which has its second ABC
airing of the season Saturday, Dec. 13 — they're also starring in a
new holiday special. "I Want a Dog for Christmas, Charlie Brown!" debuts
Tuesday, Dec. 9, on ABC.
Rerun, the younger brother of Lucy and Linus, leans on
independent-minded beagle Snoopy to supply Yuletide fun. Snoopy has
other ideas, so he persuades his brother Spike to visit — and
hopefully to entertain Rerun — but Christmas ends up much differently
than any of them anticipated.
Producer-director Bill Melendez has been pivotal to the "Peanuts"
specials since they originated with "A Charlie Brown Christmas" in 1965,
and he allows that devising a follow-up to that much-cherished program
was no easy task. "It misses the touch of the old master," Melendez says
of the late Schulz. "He was a writer and I was just an illustrator, so
it's a different thing to be put in his position."
Schulz died in 2000, and Melendez missed his presence as "I Want a
Dog for Christmas, Charlie Brown!" went through its earliest stages. "He
was always prone to start out with an original idea and not lean on the
old scripts," Melendez says. "Since his death, we've been forced to read
those scripts and try to get out of them some kind of a story.
"I'm pretty well acquainted with what the characters can and can't
do, so that part is OK," Melendez adds. "It's the business [of writing a
new special] that bothers me. We don't dare hire an outside writer,
because the [Schulz] family doesn't like that idea, so we have to go
along with what we have and what we remember."
While he realizes watching "A Charlie Brown Christmas" is a
seasonal tradition in countless households, Melendez has mixed feelings
about it returning — twice, no less — when there's also a new "Peanuts"
Christmas special. "That's dangerous," he concedes, "because people can
compare the two. I hope that we stayed on the mark and made the new one
acceptable.
