“The Life and Adventures of Santa Claus” was the last
Rankin/Bass animated Christmas show to use their “Animagic” (stop-motion
puppets) feature. It first aired on December 17, 1985, on CBS. The special
retells the story of a more obscure book (1902) by L. Frank Baum (he of “The
Wizard of Oz” fame), which gives Santa an origin narrative with a more
fantastic twist. The special is paired with “Nestor, the Long-Eared
Christmas Donkey” and was first released on DVD under the Warner Archive
brand on November 17, 2009.
The story is told as a flashback, framed by a meeting of
the Immortals, a group of elemental spirits, who are gathered together by the
Great Ak, the Master Woodsman of the World. Claus, a mortal who had been
adopted as a baby by the wood-nymph Necile, has led an exemplary life of good
and charitable deeds, but is now on the verge of death. Ak recounts ‘the life
and adventures of Santa Claus’ to convince his fellow Immortals that the man is
indeed worthy of their one and only Mantle of Immortality. Along the way his
Northern residence, reindeer, gifts to children, stockings, and decorated trees
are all given yet another explanation. The main villains of the piece are the Awgwas,
a kind of evil goblin who try to make children do bad things by making them
miserable. It ends, of course, with Claus being gifted the Mantle and becoming
the immortal present-giver that he is.
The “Life and Adventures” holds a rather odd place in the
Rankin/Bass Christmas shows. Most of their other holiday specials have at least
a tenuous continuity, starting with “Rudolph” in 1961 and lasting into the
Eighties with only a few flat contradictions here and there. Their stories
(even non-Christmas holiday specials) could be ‘calqued’ together into one long
narrative.
These
stories grew more fantastic (in the literary sense) and outré as time went on
and less based on existing lore, with “Frosty and Rudolph’s Christmas in July”
unfolding like a fever-dream Stephen R. Donaldson might have had after drinking
too much eggnog; the evil Winterbolt bears a passing resemblance to his Lord
Foul in machinations and manipulations. Perhaps Rankin/Bass was influenced by
the fantasy works being produced in-house at the time, like “The Hobbit” or “The
Last Unicorn”. Anyway, “Life and Adventures” appears in its own discrete bubble
in 1985 and puts a period to the original cycle.
My
personal memories of this show are, of course, not as steeped in nostalgia as
others. Although still keenly interested in holiday specials at the time, and
more so because it was based on a Baum book I had never read, I was in my early
twenties and was bringing a more critical eye to any new offerings. If I’m
recalling things correctly, I had to work my shift at Mr. Gatti’s the night it
premiered but had someone record it via VCR for me. I was able to catch most of
the beginning on the big in-store TV by lingering while I bussed some tables,
then intermittently saw bits of it for the next hour or so. I certainly was
impressed (and still am) by the opening number, “Ora e Sempre” (Today and
Forever). [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LlcQ3hO-EPY]
This
special is not to be confused with the 2000 animated film, the similarly named
and based “The Life and Adventures of Santa Claus”, created by Mike Young
Productions and starring (among others) Robby Benson, Jim Cummings, Maurice
LaMarche, and Hal Holbrook. This version might be fine, but somehow I have
never had the patience to watch it all the way through.
“The
Life and Adventures of Santa Claus” is paired on this DVD with another
Rankin/Bass Christmas Animagic special, “Nestor, the Long-Eared Christmas
Donkey” (1977). It is based on a 1975 song sung by Gene Autrey, who had
previously popularized “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” and “Frosty the Snowman”.
The show is more in line with the Rankin/Bass strand typified by their “The
Little Drummer Boy”, although Santa and his sleigh make an early appearance.
Narrated by Roger Miller (you know, the rooster Alan-a-Dale from Disney’s “Robin
Hood”) as Santa’s donkey (don’t ask), he explains how Nestor, a long-eared
misfit living in the Roman era, saves the first Christmas by bearing Mary and
Joseph safely the Bethlehem, thus finding his place, ‘going down in history’
like a more famous quadruped with a shiny nose. It has some few similarities to
Disney’s “The Small One”, released in 1978 but based on a 1947 book, and no similarity (save one) to the 1960 song "Dominick the Donkey" (Santa's Italian Christmas donkey!) . As a show,
I find it neither especially memorable nor offensive. It is simply a sort of
extra bonus to my Rankin/Bass collection.
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