by Jerry Williams

Created on: August 31, 2009

When my son was a pre-schooler, we watched a video of A Charlie Brown Christmas a lot. So much so, in fact, I decided to become a student of the piece. (It was either that, or smash the video with a hammer out of frustration.)

It's an incredibly endearing and complicated cartoon. In many ways the show was a product of the era it premiered in 1965 and I'll speak of that later. The qualities I'd like to explore first, however, are the elements that were well ahead of their time:

Anti-Commercialization. ACBC confronted the commercialism of Christmas long before it became a genuine cause. In fact, the show treated the exploitation as an established pattern with children longing for real estate and currency in denominations of tens and twenties. It was very sharp satire for the period.

Mental Health Issues / Holiday Blues. ACBC struck a blow for mental-health counseling in a time when the practice was viewed with skepticism at best. A depressed Charlie Brown stops by Lucy's psychiatric care stand and receives some very sound advice. (The fact that Peanuts creator Charles Schultz was a depression-sufferer is surely no coincidence.)

Children as Voice-Actors. Actual children were used to speak the lines rather than adults talking like kids a revolutionary technique at that time. In fact, the show employed age-specific children in relation to their characters. Most of the kids had to learn and deliver their lines phonetically (because many were too young too read), which resulted in a unique, unpolished dialog.

A Jazz Score. ACBC features a jazz score, particularly a lounge version of Oh Christmas Tree. The choice of music was bold and unprecedented, particularly for a children's show. ACBC probably still provides most kids with their first exposure to jazz.

No Laugh-Track. The show was produced without a laugh-track, which was unheard of for comedies and especially show-length cartoons of the 60s. This advancement helped to make the jazz score a more central part of the special.

Religious Controversy. People tend to believe that a blatantly Christian cartoon such as ACBC couldn't be produced today for a network special. Actually, even in 1965 network executives questioned whether the program was too religious. The show was finished very close to its first announced airing (and after the original sponsor, Coca-Cola, was committed); otherwise, the special might've been pulled from the schedule.

As advanced as ACBC was, the special was also a

• 1
• 2
• Next Page >>