A “Ringle, Ringle” Rave Review of Mister Magoo’s Christmas Carol

Over the last six decades or so, the post-Thanksgiving TV landscape has been inundated with animated Christmas specials on themes both sacred (A Charlie Brown Christmas) and secular (Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer). And during that time, it seems as though every cartoon favorite from The Flintstones, Bugs Bunny, Yogi Bear, and Casper to He-Man and She-Ra, Pinky and the Brain, Shrek, and Kung Fu Panda has been given their chance to spread Yuletide cheer. What a lot of folks, especially the post-Baby Boom generations, may not know is that the very first cartoon holiday program made for the small screen came out 62 years ago. It boasted an Oscar-winning songwriter, an Oscar-winning title star, and a musical adaptation of what is arguably the best-known Christmas story this side of the Gospels.

Debuting on NBC on December 18, 1962, the UPA studio’s Mister Magoo’s Christmas Carol featured myopic curmudgeon Quincy Magoo (voiced by Jim Backus) in a Broadway play-within-a-play staging of Charles Dicken’s 1843 novella. Magoo takes the lead role of Victorian London’s most miserable miser, Ebenezer Scrooge (there’s a nice in-joke where it’s said that the reason Magoo/Scrooge can’t see properly is that he refuses to spend money on eyeglasses), to whom the 25th of December is nothing more than a “humbug.” By now you’re probably aware that Scrooge’s Christmas Eve solitude will be interrupted by a visit from the spirit of his deceased business partner Jacob Marley, followed by sojourns in the company of the Ghosts of Christmases Present, Past, and Future (for some reason the order of the trio’s appearances was changed from the source material). At the conclusion of his night-long odyssey, a repentant Ebenezer vows to mend his ways and keep the meaning of the holiday in his heart, starting with his treatment of his clerk, family man Bob Cratchit.

The special does a fairly good job of fitting the major plot points of the story into its 53-minute running time. The biggest omission is of Scrooge’s nephew, Fred, from the proceedings, but most everything else is there, from young Ebenezer’s lost love Belle to the party at Old Fezziwig’s to a particularly treacly performance by Tiny Tim (whose look bears a striking similarity to UPA fave Gerald McBoing-Boing). Along with a pre-Gilligan’s Island Backus, the voice cast also features Morey Amsterdam, Jack Cassidy, Royal Dano, Paul Frees, Joan Gardner, and Jane Kean. There is also a fine score courtesy of veteran songwriters Jule Styne and Bob Merrill (who teamed up again two years later for a little musical named Funny Girl) which includes “It’s Great to Be Back on Broadway,” “Ringle Ringle,” “Along in the World,” “Winter Was Warm,” “We’re Despicable (Plunderer’s March),” and “The Lord’s Bright Blessing” (known more familiarly to anyone who’s heard it as the “Razzleberry Dressing” song). And the stylized look of the characters and backgrounds is indicative of UPA’s groundbreaking minimalist animation style.

I have vague memories of watching the show when it first aired (I was four years old then) and for several years thereafter (NBC ran it annually from 1962 to 1969, and it played in syndication in the decades since), when it was surpassed in popularity by such newer fare as Rudolph, Charlie Brown, and How the Grinch Stole Christmas, among many others. This was my first exposure to the Dickens tale, and along with the emotional impact of Scrooge’s eventual redemption there were plenty of spooky moments (Marley’s face on the door knocker, the visit by the Spirit of Christmas Yet to Come) alongside the comedic ones (the ragpickers’ rendition of “We’re Despicable”).

The special’s popularity in its initial airings led NBC to commission UPA to produce a prime-time animated series, The Famous Adventures of Mr. Magoo, which ran on Saturday nights during the 1964-65 season. Just like Christmas Carol, the show featured Quincy Magoo playing renowned figures from history and literature (Paul Revere, Gunga Din, Long John Silver, and Dr. Frankenstein, to name a few). Similarly, the original show’s lasting impact on the pop culture zeitgeist was evidenced in its being featured–or parodied–in Hill Street Blues, Six Feet Under and The Simpsons, and on the big screen in 1988’s Scrooged. It’s a safe bet that Dickens never envisioned his misanthropic miser being portrayed by a nearsighted cartoon actor, but I have a feeling he would have been pleased as hot rum punch with how this groundbreaking holiday presentation treated his work.