Revisiting the ‘Magic’ Holiday Special

On December 9, 1965, nearly half the TV sets in the country were tuned to A Charlie Brown Christmas, where the gang from the popular comic strip Peanuts came to (animated) life. In the half-hour special, accompanied by that great jazzy soundtrack, hapless Charlie Brown has the holiday blues: “Instead of feeling happy, I feel sorta let down.” But one endearingly scraggly tree later, he discovers the true meaning of Christmas — and the show became a beloved seasonal staple. As Benjamin L. Clark, curator of the Charles M. Schulz Museum, tells Us: “It’s a Christmas miracle unto itself.”

Scroll on for more stories behind the story of this holiday classic:

Who Was Involved

After collaborating on a never-released documentary titled A Boy Named Charlie Brown, producer Lee Mendelson, Peanuts creator Charles M. Schulz and animator Bill Melendez were asked by the ad agency McCann Erickson and Coca-Cola to create a family-friendly Christmas special. Despite running $20,000 over their modest $76,000 budget, the team delivered under the pressure of a less-than-six-month deadline.

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Why We Remember It

Mendelson’s son, Jason Mendelson, part of the Peanuts universe since childhood, shares his theory on the show’s appeal: “Like Charlie, we all go through something where we don’t feel like we’re part of the joy, but of course, we are,” he tells Us. “And the beauty of it is, by the end of the show, they’ve all come together to celebrate that tree and enjoy the magic of being together at the holidays, and that is the point. A Charlie Brown Christmas belongs to everybody.”

Key Details

“Christmas Time Is Here” and other iconic Vince Guaraldi Trio songs were sung not by the young voice cast but by choir kids from St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in San Rafael, California. “We got $5 and some ice cream,” David Willat, who was 11 at the time, tells Us, “but we got to be involved with a show that has touched so many people.” Guaraldi preferred less polish in order to make the vocals sound like the Peanuts gang singing on a street corner, he recalls: “The kids had to deliberately sound unprofessional — and we succeeded.” The soundtrack (recently rereleased on a cool new Zoetrope vinyl album that “animates” as the record spins) is now the best-selling Christmas soundtrack of all time.

A New Perspective

The production encountered so many “good grief!” obstacles, it’s amazing to see it still going strong. The naysaying began with the first cut shown to suits: “It’s chil

dren talking about their feelings, which was unheard of. Sincerity for days, right?” Jason says. Execs worried about the lack of action, the absence of a laugh track and Linus’s Biblical quotation. (To make matters worse, Schulz’s name was misspelled as “Schultz” in the credits!) CBS moved forward with the special only because the ads were paid for and the listing had already appeared in TV Guide — though they began to question the three-special contract they had signed. Still, the project had its believers: Jason said that animator Bill Littlejohn stood up after a Los Angeles screening and proclaimed, “‘This show’s gonna run for 100 years!’” (We’re already 6/10 of the way there!)

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Where Are They Now?

Charlie Brown, Snoopy, Linus, Lucy et al continue to expand the Peanuts TV library (including August’s A Summer Musical, above) on Apple TV, which is home to A Charlie Brown Christmas. If you don’t subscribe, you can stream for free December 13–14. (Jason Mendelson recently recounted even more behind-the-scenes details about the special on the essential podcast “You Don’t Know Peanuts.”) Meanwhile, in Santa Rosa, California, the Schulz Museum is hosting an anniversary exhibit with animation cels, original script pages and adorable thank-you notes sent to sponsor Coca-Cola. “We have wonderful fan mail that people can browse through — it’s so immediate,” said curator Clark. “People can read for themselves the wonderful warm letters and postcards that people mailed to express their joy and happiness.”