Merry Christmas, Charlie Brown... An Exhibit

How could I resist this at the Temecula Valley Museum?

For millions of Americans, it really isn’t Christmas until they have watched A Charlie Brown Christmas at least once! This seasonal exhibition examines the making of this animated classic and celebrates the anticipation, joy, and pitfalls of the holiday season in 50 framed and matted Peanuts daily and Sunday comic strips.
This exhibition, Merry Christmas, Charlie Brown, consists of high-quality digital reproductions of Charles M. Schulz’s original Peanuts strips with thematic graphics, an introductory panel, and a biographical panel about Charles Schulz that includes photographs of Schulz family celebrations. Also included are the DVD program, “The Making of A Charlie Brown Christmas,” didactic panels with photographs, and artifacts related to the making of the holiday classic. In addition, the exhibition contains vintage three-dimensional Peanuts-themed seasonal novelties, including several from the exclusive Determined Productions, Inc. collection.

Charles Schulz addressed most aspects of the holiday season, from the sometimes less-than-sincere letters to Santa to the post-Christmas blues, with his trademark wit and whimsy, allowing the rest of us to recognize and laugh at some of our holiday rituals and foibles. However, not all of Schulz's holiday strips are tongue-in-cheek. In several strips he brings a child's wonder, innocence, and sincerity to the Christmas story. In Schulz's life, the Christmas season meant spending time with loved ones the more the merrier. One more at the table was always fine with him! All the anticipation, joy, and pitfalls of the holiday season are creatively reflected in the Peanuts strips selected for this exhibition. We delighted in reading them all, with giggles abounding.

In the spring of 1965, independent film producer Lee Mendelson was desperately trying to find a sponsor to televise an earlier documentary that he had produced, A Boy Named Charlie Brown, which chronicled a typical day in Charles Schulz's life. When Mendelson did find a sponsor, Coca-Cola, they were more interested in an animated Peanuts special for the upcoming Christmas season than they were in a documentary. As any intrepid producer would do, when Mendelson got a call from Coca- Cola's agent on Wednesday asking for an outline for an animated holiday special by Monday, he said something along the lines of "no problem."

Mendelson made a hurried telephone call to Schulz and the very next day the two of them, along with animator Bill Melendez, developed the concept of and completed the outline for A Charlie Brown Christmas, in what must be a record for a single day's effort! They agreed on a handful of core elements that included: winter scenes with snow and ice skating, a school play, a scene to be read from the Bible, and a soundtrack combining jazz and traditional music. The outline was finally approved by Coca-Cola after what seemed like three very long weeks. That left only six short months to produce what would become one of the best loved specials of all time. Interestingly, it was the first animated film to use child actors for the characters' voices. It surprised me that it had never been done. The only adult voice was that of Snoopy. Wild.
I loved this. Coca-Cola received hundreds of fan letters praising A Charlie Brown Christmas which they assembled into a scrapbook and presented to Schulz. It is interesting to note in these letters that some of the things that concerned people then: the commercialization of Christmas, the crudeness of advertisements, and the quality of television programming, still concern many people almost 60 years later.
One gentleman wrote," Dear Sir: The half hour spent last night watching "Charlie Brown's Christmas" was the most enjoyable and memorable I have ever spent. Charlie Brown's Christmas is destined to become a classic, looked forward to yearly the same as White Christmas and Dicken's Christmas Carol. The handling of the delicate transition from the pure entertainment to the poignant message was beautiful. I will be looking forward to next year's presentation. Yours truly."







After 50 years of creating the Peanuts comic strip, Charles Schulz officially retired in December 1999. For many years prior, he repeatedly stated that the strip would retire with him. Prophetically, Schulz died in his sleep on February 12, 2000, just hours before his last original strip appeared in the Sunday newspapers. Just writing this makes me teary.

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