Musical Monday

I love Mister Magoo’s Christmas Carol. I remember an earlier time when there was a more divided opinion of it.  A time after that, I often heard and read a lot of folks list this as their favorite. Now, it is an undeniable classic!  There is so much about it that on the surface that shouldn’t appeal to contemporary younger audiences, but it holds up!

 If I were to judge this solely on the merits of its adaptation from A Christmas Carol, this wouldn’t get very far. I love this version as one of my personal favorites on many levels and criteria beyond it being A Christmas Carol.

The common knowledge: this was made in 1962. It has the distinction of being the first animated U.S. Christmas Special made for television. And of course, it uses the cartoon-short character Mr. Magoo as Ebenezer Scrooge.

As I’ve written often in the past, I do not have childhood nostalgic attachments to this version though I’m in the right age range for its first decade and a half. The animated versions I grew up with and watched regularly as child were the 1969 and 1971 animated versions. This was despite the fact I really liked Mr. Magoo as child, watching his half-hour show of shorts; I absolutely loved The Famous Adventures of Mr. Magoo show. I knew of Mr. Magoo’s Christmas Carol and remember seeing it only once as a child (after I had seen 1969’s which was my first ACC). I didn’t personally “discover” Mr. Magoo’s Christmas Carol (MMCC) until I was in my early teens. By my early teens, I had become a theatre and Broadway musical aficionado. I still remember well when I took notice of MMCC. One weekend, visiting my father, I watched a broadcast of the show through very different eyes from my one childhood viewing and I was hooked.

It was then I recognized this show served as a kind of template for The Famous Adventures of Mr. Magoo. But there was so much more – especially in what I heard, not simply viewed: an actual Broadway styled musical with voice talents that I mostly recognized, even as a young teenager.

The biggest hook for me was, and remains, the talent behind the production. This is why it’s enduring.

Jule Styne and Bob Merrill did the music and lyrics. They did Funny Girl! My theatre geek meter was off the charts. Jule Styne wrote the music for Gypsy, which I had also discovered as a teenager, and it became (and still is) one of my favorite musicals. Of course, the songs for MMCC are top-notch and enjoyable. The Styne-Merrill offerings alone are enough to make this enjoyable and memorable.

Then there was the voice talent. Obviously, there was Jim Backus as Mr. Magoo. But it had Morey Amsterdam, the fantastic Royal Dano, and Les Tremayne. Paul Frees is always recognizable (as a mainstay in Rankin-Bass Christmas specials, it was fascinating to see this was Frees’ first Christmas special and before Rankin-Bass). Finally, there was Jack Cassidy. As I had discovered theatre, I discovered Cassidy with it – not much by him, but enough that I liked him. My personal discovery of MMCC coincided with the time of Cassidy’s tragic death. I knew all these names and talents in my early teens and was in geek-awe. Seeing this version of A Christmas Carol was so cool-as-cool-could-be for a theatre geek.

As I wrote previously, I also recognized this as a template for The Famous Adventures of Mr. Magoo cartoon, which was actually one of my favorite cartoon shows during the 60’s portion of my childhood. There was the distinctive UPA animation style they did for TV that was nostalgic for me (it still is). The style of the backgrounds is pure mid-century modern illustration and design, very commonly seen in 1950’s and 1960’s advertising and graphic art.

Finally, I was always impressed with the fact that the Mr. Magoo character doesn’t play Scrooge as Magoo. This is because of MMCC’s original concept. Mr. Magoo is an actor playing Scrooge. This was innovative as it gave the creators the excuse to use Mr. Magoo without having to fully sacrifice the seriousness of the Scrooge character.

This concept opens the special with Mr. Magoo able to be his usual vision impaired self; while singing the opening musical number about how great it is to back on Broadway, he attempts to get to the theatre in time to play Scrooge. From that point, the story of A Christmas Carol is presented as a musical being performed on stage. When the play is finished (with a curtain call!) Mr. Magoo is back as himself with a few of his vision impaired mishaps winding up the special. What I like is that the play within the show concept doesn’t just bookend it. There are brief moments where there are “scene changes.” We see shots of the stage as if we were in the audience, with other seated audience members in view, while applause is heard. These spots were obviously used for TV commercial breaks.

This still gives A Christmas Carol a serious treatment, at least as much as an early 60’s American cartoon could give it. Mr. Magoo isn’t the only established cartoon character in it, either. The cartoon character Gerald McBoing-Boing appears as Tiny Tim – a strange turn as the McBoing-Boing character didn’t normally speak but did here as Tiny Tim. Despite two established cartoon characters, this doesn’t give the treatment of “character as a character” like Rich Little’s Christmas Carol or Micky’s Christmas Carol does.

Royal Dano is good voicing the cartoon Marley’s Ghost who is drawn with just a tad of creepiness; that was probably all that as it was allowed for a cartoon in 1962.

A known “no-no” here is the very noticeable changing of the order of the ghosts. The ghost visits are ordered Present, Past, Future. I’ve often tried to imagine what was the motivation for this change, but who knows what it could have been. Sometimes I imagine it was believed it flowed better for their concept and balanced the talent of some of the performers.

An always confusing aspect with the Ghost of Christmas Past (not counting the altered order of appearance) is it’s sequence gives the appearance of being incomplete.  After the breakup of Scrooge and Belle, Scrooge begs for no more.  The Ghost says “One shadow more…” while waving its holly branch.  The scene changes with Scrooge again begging and the Ghost has a completely different expression before leaving.

My opinion has always been that Belle usually gets the best song in musical versions of ACC. In this version she has what I think is the best song: a pretty, slightly melancholy tune called “Winter Was Warm” sung by the wonderful Jane Kean. However, all the songs are enjoyable; with some it’s easy to find yourself singing or humming them after viewing the cartoon.

The song “We’re Despicable” performed by the charwoman, laundress, undertaker, and Old Joe is not only villainously comic, it could easily be a show stopping number in a live production. It’s a precursor to comedic musical numbers by villains in later shows such as “Master of the House” from Les Miserables.

There are a lot of missing bits from A Christmas Carol that are easy to spot. But when sitting back and just enjoying how marvelous MMCC is on its own, I don’t notice them. I always encourage anyone that is not a fan of this version to give it a try by viewing it beyond being A Christmas Carol adaptation.

My current copy is the DVD release. In the special features you can hear the original overture for the special. The overture was never used but was planned to be included on an intended soundtrack album. Unfortunately, the album was never produced. On the DVD, it is included in the extras when comparing original drawings to the finished stills of the special.

Missing

• Scrooge’s nephew Fred is nowhere to be seen
• Scrooge’s sister, Fan
• Belle as a married woman
• Ignorance & Want
• Scrooge corpse
• As there is no Fred, there is no visit to Fred’s house on Christmas