I don’t know exactly when I became a fan of Charlie Brown and the “Peanuts” characters, but I can remember them being a huge part of my elementary school years, along with a group of friends who loved the comic strip. One thing I do know: A Charlie Brown Christmas has always been a part of my holiday celebrations, including this Christmas.
Every year growing up, we would watch A Charlie Brown Christmas when it came on television. It was always on CBS, and Peter Paul candies sponsored it — I still remember the York Peppermint Patty and “Sometimes you feel like a nut” commercials.
But it wasn’t just on TV that I experienced A Charlie Brown Christmas. I had the book and record, which contained most of the script, and I probably listened to it more than just at Christmastime. I could quote most of the dialogue along with the characters, and I still can to this day.
There’s so much that drew me to the “Peanuts” comic strip and to A Charlie Brown Christmas. As a precocious kid, I understood many of the references in those comics that many of my peers didn’t. I could identify with Charlie Brown, the kid who somehow managed to not fit in and fit in at the same time with the same people. And, like the “Peanuts” characters, I wasn’t afraid to wax theological from time to time.
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In fact, it’s all those things that made A Charlie Brown Christmas an unlikely success. The ball began rolling when television producer Lee Mendelson sought to film a documentary about Charles M. Schulz, the “Peanuts” creator. An advertising executive was looking for a project for Coca-Cola to become involved with during the holiday season, and Mendelson pitched a “Peanuts” Christmas special.
Mendelson went back to Schulz with just five days for the artist to come up with an outline. Schulz had plenty of ideas that included “winter scenes, a school play, a scene to be read from the Bible, and a soundtrack combining jazz and traditional music.” That outline remained basically the same throughout the production.
There were so many things about A Charlie Brown Christmas that shouldn’t have worked. The special dealt with alienation and depression, discussed other psychological topics comically, addressed the commercialization of the holiday season, and used actual children as the voices of child characters. The kids in the cartoon talk about “pantophobia” and “a big Eastern syndicate” and make statements like, “It staggers the imagination.” And the sophisticated jazz score didn’t quite fit in with the pop music of the day or with what people expected to hear in Christmas specials.
And then there’s the recitation of a portion of the Bible’s Christmas story. The reference to the true meaning of Christmas was something that Schulz insisted on, and he wouldn’t budge from including the Bible in his special. Christopher Shea, the voice of Linus, was perfect for the delivery of a truly touching moment.
When Mendelson showed the finished product to a group of animators, the reception was lukewarm, until, in Mendelson’s words, “one animator in the back of the room stood up and said: ’You guys are nuts — this is going to run for years and years.'”
That animator was more right than he knew. A Charlie Brown Christmas won rave reviews, stellar ratings, a Peabody Award, and an Emmy. It ran on broadcast television for 44 years. Apple acquired the rights to the special in 2020 with the stipulation that Apple TV streams it for free for at least a three-day period each year. This year, Apple TV+ is streaming A Charlie Brown Christmas for free from Dec. 22-25.
This charming, heartwarming Christmas special has become a tradition for countless families, and it’s as fresh and innovative as it ever was, despite the fact that it was never hip and edgy. Charles M. Schulz and Lee Mendelson managed to bring sophistication and a little bit of the Gospel to viewers from 1965 through today. For plenty of people like me, A Charlie Brown Christmas is an essential part of the season.
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