The first was A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving (first broadcast in 1973), which is always disappointing. The plot makes very little sense, and the characters are so frustrating that you hope that Lucy will let loose on them and give them hell -- but she never does.
If you're not familiar with the plot, such as it is, it's this: The terminally stupid Peppermint Patty invites herself and two of her friends over to the Brown house for Thanksgiving, even though the Browns will not be home, because she's a selfish jerk and that's what selfish jerks do. Charlie Brown knows they're coming, but behaves even more spinelessly than ever, not even able to use the simple truth as a means of keeping these freeloaders at bay. This means that Charlie, his friend Linus (who should know better), his dog, and his dog's bird have to make a woeful feast for these people, mostly of toast and popcorn. It is, predictably, a disaster. The situation is resolved thanks to Marcie, using a callback to the Miles Standish / Priscilla Mullins story in a way that fits just like a hand in a shoe.
Usually you overlook the fact that the parents of these children are just faceless ciphers, but in real life the Browns would have had to step in. At one point Charlie Brown decides to call his grandmother -- no parents are consulted -- to tell her they will be coming over late for dinner. Even as a little kid I found that behavior outrageous.
It has its moments, but it is a great fall-off from A Charlie Brown Christmas (1965) and It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown (1966), or non-holiday specials like Charlie Brown's All Stars! (1966), even though the Thanksgiving one was written by Schulz and put together by the same people. Part of the problem is that between 1966 and 1973 Snoopy became a cultural titan and Woodstock was introduced -- the era that Christopher Caldwell might consider its "dog ate my comic strip" downfall. I always found Peppermint Patty too stupid for a strip that had kids reading Tolstoy and the Epistles (Linus: “I always feel like I am reading someone elses's mail!"). I don't know why I watch it. It's the second-worst Peanuts special I recall, the worst being the just-mailing-it-in It's a Mystery, Charlie Brown in 1974. I haven't seen most of the post-Easter Beagle entries.
These days ABC shows it paired with "The Mayflower Voyagers," the first episode of This Is America, Charlie Brown. It was a historical program that I would have thought had been done for the Bicentennial, but actually ran in 1988-89. This is the only episode that has been rerun, probably because it makes a timely appearance with the other Thanksgiving special. It's also pretty alarming for a children's cartoon, for it features the various characters as kids aboard the Mayflower but makes no bones about the massive loss of life suffered by the Pilgrims between the time they left England to the first Thanksgiving. The kids also look small, because they are seen with actual adults, which makes them seem more vulnerable to their constant perils. It really is an excellent history lesson, though, for kids willing to stick with it.
Another thing I saw on Thanksgiving Day was The March of the Wooden Soldiers. Or most of it. For many years channel 11 in New York, WPIX, showed this 1934 Laurel and Hardy film on Thanksgiving, starting in 1963; I remember seeing it when I was a kid. It left me cold back then -- too many of those melodramatic 30's moments, too many long operetta songs. But when waterboarding started making the news over a decade ago, I immediately thought of Oliver Hardy getting ducked in the pond and nearly drowned as part of his penalty for burglary. That scene scared me more than the bogeymen, probably because it was supposed to be funny. (Now I think it is kind of funny.)
Seeing it again was interesting. The melodrama is still eye-rolling, but I have grown to appreciate the comic delivery and timing of Laurel and Hardy more than I ever did in my childhood. I also admired the part of the wicked Silas Barnaby, played by Henry Brandon (billed at the time as Henry Kleinbach). He does the melodramatic villain perfectly, chewing that scenery like it was made of gingerbread. I was surpised to find out that Henry was born in Germany (real name: Heinrich von Kleinbach) and was only 22 when he played Barnaby. Just a great, fun villain. He went on to have a long career playing all kinds of ethnic types, up until the year before he died, 1990.
The plot is brisk, if you leave out the songs, and I suppose the climax of the movie is thrilling. I don't know, because my dogs decided they both really, really had to go out just then and wouldn't stop whining, then they both dawdled outdoors like we weren't standing in 16-degree weather with a windchill of OW, and when I got back inside the movie was over and WPIX was on to something else. Thanks, boys.
Another thing I didn't see was Holiday Inn, the 1942 Bing Crosby / Fred Astaire film with a mostly terrific score by Irving Berlin. TCM has not run it yet, but it is scheduled for this Sunday at 10 p.m. The movie famously features songs for the various American holidays, and some are better than others -- you may have heard of a ditty called "White Christmas," which was an instant smash even though the film's New York premiere was August 4. (A late family member who saw the film first-run said that everyone left the theater singing "White Christmas." In August.)
Other songs from the film are less successful, to say the least. The Washington's Birthday number "I Can't Tell a Lie" is just a bad song. Hey, Berlin wrote an estimated 1,250 songs; got to be a few clunkers along the way. The Lincoln's Birthday number, "Abraham," is much better, but the movie plot requires it to be performed in blackface -- which is why TCM is not showing the movie in prime time, I would guess.
Other top-drawer songs include "Happy Holiday," "Easter Parade," "Lazy," and a straight musical number that Astaire taps out with fireworks that just gets better every time I see it. You know it's a successful score when two songs become the title tracks to other movies: "White Christmas" with Crosby (1954) and "Easter Parade" with Astaire (1948).
One of my other favorites from Holiday Inn, though, is the Thanksgiving song, "I've Got Plenty to Be Thankful For." And since we're in Thanksgiving weekend still, I'd like to leave you with it.
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