Balladeer’s Blog’s Ninth Annual Christmas Carol-A-Thon, also called Carol-A-Thon 2018, rolls along with Ponsett’s Christmas Carol. Back during Christmas Carol-A-Thon 2013 I reviewed The Trail to Christmas (1957), Jimmy Stewart’s television adaptation of this particular radio play.
Stewart was basically cannibalizing his own radio show, The Six-Shooter, on which that Old West version of A Christmas Carol, titled Ponsett’s Christmas Carol, first aired. Continue reading
Filed under A CHRISTMAS CAROL
Here at Balladeer’s Blog I’m known for my strange sense of humor and my love of oddities, the more obscure the better. How could you NOT love the internet when it lets you find virtually any particular cultural kitsch that you get in the mood for?
In addition to K-Mart Christmas Muzak from 1974 plenty of other years are available, all the way up to the 21st Century. Just pick your favorite year and listen!
After all, what could be more Christmassy than the periodic between-song reminders that smoking is permitted ONLY at the Snack Bar. Or a Blue Light Special in the Deli! It’s like an audio version of a Currier and Ives Christmas Print! (I’m kidding.)
Filed under A CHRISTMAS CAROL, Neglected History
BR’ER RABBIT’S CHRISTMAS CAROL (1992) – Balladeer’s Blog’s Ninth Annual Christmas Carol-A-Thon continues! Br’er Rabbit, Br’er Fox, Br’er Bear, Br’er Gator and many other characters created by Joel Chandler Harris are featured in this animated version of the Dickens tale.
Br’er Rabbit’s Christmas Carol is my favorite out of all the versions which present A Christmas Carol as the framework of a Mission Impossible/ Leverage “con job” to make a greedy character change their ways. To nobody’s surprise, Br’er Fox is the Scrooge stand-in who requires a wakeup call.
All the characters live in a town in the American South, where a charity stage production of A Christmas Carol is being performed, with the proceeds going to benefit the terribly ill Timmy Mouse. No, not “Br’er Timmy” or anything like that, just Timmy Mouse as our Tiny Tim stand-in.
Br’er Fox has no time for silly fiction and is completely unfamiliar with the Dickens Christmas classic. That fact gives Br’er Rabbit the idea to work with his friends to instill some holiday spirit into Br’er Fox, who refuses to help Timmy Mouse and charges the other animals exorbitant prices for the firewood he sells. If they can’t afford to pay, they go cold. Continue reading
Filed under A CHRISTMAS CAROL
Balladeer’s Blog’s 9th Annual Christmas Carol-A-Thon continues with this song from the 1970 musical Scrooge.
Filed under A CHRISTMAS CAROL
Balladeer’s Blog’s 9th Annual Christmas Carol-A-Thon rolls along, as today brings a look at an individual song from one of the many adaptations of the Carol. It’s December the 25th from Scrooge (1970).
Filed under A CHRISTMAS CAROL
Balladeer’s Blog’s 9th Annual Christmas Carol-A-Thon continues!
Before MST3K there was … The Texas 27 Film Vault!
In the middle 1980s, way down on Level 31 Randy Clower and Richard Malmos, machine-gun toting Film Vault Technicians First Class hosted this neglected cult show.
SCROOGE (1935)
ORIGINAL BROADCAST DATE: December 14th, 1985 to the best that can be determined.
SERIAL: Before showing and mocking the movie our members of the Film Vault Corps showed and mocked a chapter of Flash Gordon Conquers the Universe (1940).
In that serial Ming the Merciless unleashes a disease called the Purple Death on Earth, prompting Flash Gordon, Dale Arden and Dr Zarkov to fly to the planet Mongo to find a cure and defeat Ming for good.
HOST SEGMENTS: None have been unearthed for this episode yet. As always if any other fans of this show have any info they would like to share feel free to contact me – see my About page for details.
We’ve come a long way toward tentatively reconstructing a tiny bit of this show’s history over the past few years so hopefully more memories will be jogged.
MOVIE: Continue reading
Filed under A CHRISTMAS CAROL, Bad and weird movies, Movie Hosts
Balladeer’s Blog’s Christmas Carol-A-Thon 2018 continues with a look at this animated sequel to All Dogs Go To Heaven.
The dog-angel characters from that reasonably successful film use their Heavenly powers to get the dog-gangster Carface Caruthers (Ernest Borgnine) to change his ways. The portions of this direct-to- video flick dealing with the actual Christmas Carol adaptation are very good.
Unfortunately that element takes up barely half of the story. The overall tale is about a demonic figure called Belladonna (Bebe Neuwirth) who wants to use a gigantic magic dog bone to manipulate all of Earth’s dogs in a plot to destroy Christmas. Dog-Angels Charlie Barkin (Steven Weber) and Itchy (Dom Deluise) from the previous movie need the help of canine crime-lord Carface to thwart Belladonna’s plans. Hence the plot to “Dickens” him into becoming a better man … or dog, actually. Continue reading
Filed under A CHRISTMAS CAROL
Christmas Carol-A-Thon 2018 rolls along. Heath – one of Balladeer’s Blog’s long-time readers – has done a Supercut version of A Christmas Carol. The video runs 53 minutes and is sheer genius! Plus the rest of the videos on Heath’s channel are worth checking out as well!
Filed under A CHRISTMAS CAROL, humor
EBBIE (1995) Balladeer’s Blog’s Ninth Annual Christmas Carol-A-Thon rolls along with this 1995 telefilm starring soap opera queen Susan Lucci. The eternally-sexy Lucci plays Elizabeth “Ebbie” Scrooge, our regulation “grasping and covetous” business magnate who runs the Dobson’s department store empire. This version of A Christmas Carol is kind of cute and it tries hard.
At its core Ebbie combines the Dickens tale with elements of the Diane Keaton movie Baby Boom. The dialogue self-consciously uses Big Business/ Executive Culture cliches in various exchanges. For example, where Scrooge normally says “Can’t I take them (the Ghosts) all at once and have it over with” Ebbie instead says “Can’t I just Conference Call them all in and have it over with?” Plus Marley’s Ghost refers to Scrooge “taking meetings” with the three Spirits. Sometimes these substitutions are amusing, other times just eye-rolling.
Ebbie is one of those Carols which make the Ghosts look like people that the Scrooge figure knows in real life. Personally I don’t care for that approach but others do, so it’s all just a question of taste. An interesting note is that outside of Susan Lucci and the guy who plays her late partner Jake Marley (Jeffrey DeMunn) virtually NOBODY in the cast is recognizable. It’s like The Susan Lucci Community Theater Players Present A Christmas Carol.
Taking the crucial elements of the tale in order: Continue reading
Filed under A CHRISTMAS CAROL
Here is the iconic Holiday standard Hooray For Santy Claus! It’s by the poor man’s Skitch Henderson – Milton De Lugg – and The Little Eskimos.
And here’s the version by Al “Green Hornet Theme” Hirt: Continue reading
Filed under A CHRISTMAS CAROL, Bad and weird movies
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