It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown

It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown
Title card from 1966 TV special
Genre	Animated TV Special
Created by	Charles M. Schulz
Written by	Charles M. Schulz
Directed by	Bill Melendez
Voices of	Peter Robbins Sally Dryer Kathy Steinberg Christopher Shea Gabrielle DeFaria Ritter Lisa DeFaria Ann Altieri Glenn Mendelson Bill Melendez
Theme music composer	Vince Guaraldi
Composer(s)	Vince Guaraldi
Country of origin	United States
Language(s)	English
Production
Executive producer(s)	Lee Mendelson
Producer(s)	Lee Mendelson Bill Melendez
Editor(s)	Robert T. Gillis Steven Melendez
Cinematography	Nick Vasu
Running time	25 minutes
Broadcast
Original channel	CBS
First shown in	October 27, 1966 (1966-10-27)
Chronology
Preceded by	Charlie Brown's All-Stars
Followed by	You're in Love, Charlie Brown

It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown is a 1966 American prime time animated television special based on the comic strip Peanuts by Charles M. Schulz.

A Halloween special, it was the third Peanuts special (and second holiday-themed special, following A Charlie Brown Christmas) to be produced and animated by Bill Melendez. Its initial broadcast took place on October 27, 1966, on CBS, preempting My Three Sons. CBS re-aired the special annually through 2000, with ABC picking up the rights beginning in 2001. The program was nominated for an Emmy award. It has been issued on home video several times, including a Remastered Deluxe Edition of the special released by Warner Home Video on September 2, 2008, with the bonus feature It's Magic, Charlie Brown which was released in 1981.

To celebrate its 40th anniversary, a retrospective book was published in 2006 entitled, It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown: The Making of a Television Classic with the entire script, never-before-seen photographs, storyboard excerpts, and interviews with the original child actors who provided the voices of the Peanuts gang.

Plot

With autumn already in full swing, the Peanuts gang prepares for Halloween. Linus van Pelt writes his annual letter to The Great Pumpkin, despite Charlie Brown's disbelief, Snoopy's laughter, Patty's assurance that the Great Pumpkin is a fake, and even his own sister's violent threat to make her brother stop. When Linus goes out to mail the letter but cannot reach the mailbox, Lucy refuses to help him; so he uses his blanket to open the box, and throws the letter in.

On Halloween night, the gang, including Charlie Brown's younger sister Sally, goes trick-or-treating. On the way, they stop at the pumpkin patch to ridicule Linus' missing the festivities, just as he did last year; but Linus is convinced that the Great Pumpkin, recognizing the sincerity of his patch, will come, and even persuades Sally to stay and wait with him. The gang goes off, leaving Linus and Sally behind. During trick-or-treating, everyone gets assorted candy, apples, gum, cookies, money, and popcorn balls except for Charlie Brown, who gets a rock from every house they visit. After trick-or-treating, and another visit to the pumpkin patch, the gang goes off to Violet Gray's Halloween party. Meanwhile, Snoopy, wearing his World War I flying ace gear, climbs aboard his Sopwith Camel (his doghouse) to fight with the Red Baron. After a fierce but losing battle, Snoopy makes his way across the countryside to briefly crash the Halloween party, where he is entertained by Schroeder's playing of World War I tunes on his piano, and then goes to the pumpkin patch. When Linus sees a shadowy figure rising from the moonlit patch, he believes the Great Pumpkin has arrived, and faints. When Sally sees that it is only Snoopy, she is angered over missing the trick-or-treating festivities as well as the Halloween party as the kids come to take her away with them. As they leave, and still convinced that the Great Pumpkin will show up, Linus promises to put in a good word for them.

At 4:00 AM the next morning, Lucy wakes up and sees that Linus is not in his bed. She finds her brother asleep in the pumpkin patch, brings him home, takes his shoes off, and puts him to bed. Later, Charlie Brown and Linus are at a rock wall, commiserating about the previous night's disappointments. When Charlie Brown says that he has done stupid things in his life also, Linus angrily vows to him that the Great Pumpkin will come to the pumpkin patch next year.

Voice actors

• Christopher Shea as Linus van Pelt
• Peter Robbins as Charlie Brown and Pig-Pen
• Sally Dryer as Lucy van Pelt
• Glenn Mendelson as Schroeder
• Kathy Steinberg as Sally Brown
• Ann Altieri as Violet Gray
• Lisa DeFaria as Patty
• Bill Melendez as Snoopy

Viewer response

Charlie Brown's repeated line of "I got a rock" caused some stir among many viewers of the show, according to Charles Schulz in the book and retrospective TV special "Happy Birthday, Charlie Brown." Schulz said that after the program first aired, bags and boxes of candy came in from all over the world "just for Charlie Brown."

Production

CBS telecast edits

During the 1980s and 1990s, when the special aired on CBS, the network trimmed the "trick-or-treat" sequence, such that after the Peanuts gang knock on the first door and say "trick-or-treat," it cuts to the gang after they finished trick-or-treating comparing what they got at the last house.

ABC telecast edits

To make room for the longer commercial breaks during modern airings, ABC cut two scenes, which were later restored when aired in conjunction with You're Not Elected, Charlie Brown:

• Lucy pleading Charlie Brown to kick the football, and subsequently pulling it away as he tries to do so, a staple in the comic strips since 1952.
• Snoopy (as the World War I flying ace) prompting Schroeder to play World War I era songs.

Music

The music was performed by the Vince Guaraldi Sextet. The lively instrumental, "Linus and Lucy", associated originally with A Charlie Brown Christmas, is used at the beginning of this cartoon as Linus and Lucy prepare a pumpkin to be a jack-o-lantern, as Linus mails his letter to The Great Pumpkin, and when Lucy wakes up at 4 AM to take Linus home from the pumpkin patch. Guaraldi's theme for the special, "The Great Pumpkin Waltz," plays throughout, as when Linus is writing the Great Pumpkin towards the beginning.

The World War I songs played by Schroeder on his toy piano while Snoopy dances are:

The "Happy" Songs:

"It's a Long Way to Tipperary"

"Pack Up Your Troubles in Your Old Kit-Bag"

The "Sad" Songs:

"There's a Long, Long Trail"

"Roses of Picardy"

Popular culture references

The final segment of "Treehouse of Horror XIX" (the fourth episode of the twentieth season of The Simpsons) is called "It's the Grand Pumpkin, Milhouse". It is a parody of It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown (and was supposed to be named "It's the Great Pumpkin, Milhouse", but due to legal reasons, was rejected) and contains several references to the Peanuts series. In the segment, Milhouse wears the same clothes and plays the same role as Linus van Pelt. Lisa is modelled after Sally Brown and Bart looks like Charlie Brown; he even says "good grief", echoing Charlie Brown's catchphrase. A redesigned version of Santa's Little Helper can be seen sleeping on top of his dog house and Homer is seen sleeping on top of his house in a manner similar to Snoopy. When Marge first speaks, she uses a muted trombone. This is a parody of the "wah wah wah" voice that is used for adults in the various Peanuts specials. The dance scene during the Halloween party is a parody of the dance scene in A Charlie Brown Christmas right down to Kang and Kodos in a non-speaking cameo as the twins 3 and 4." Parts of the segment had music by Vince Guaraldi (best known for composing music for animated adaptations of the Peanuts comic strip), which they had obtained the rights to use.

The special is mentioned in the power metal band Helloween's song "Halloween", from their 1987 album Keeper of the Seven Keys, Pt. 1. It was a puzzle on the October 26, 2011, episode of Wheel of Fortune.^{[citation needed]}

Home video releases

"It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown" was first released on VHS by Hi-Tops Video as part of its Snoopy's Home Video Library. This version included the CBS edit of the "trick-or-treat" scene and removed the entire sequence of Schroeder playing World War I-era songs. Paramount later released the special on VHS in the 90s. It was later released on DVD on September 12, 2000 with You're Not Elected, Charlie Brown as a bonus special. After Warner Brothers obtained the off-air rights to the Charlie Brown library of TV specials, they released a new DVD release under the new "Remastered Deluxe Edition" line on September 2, 2008. On this DVD, the bonus special was It's Magic, Charlie Brown (You're Not Elected, Charlie Brown got its own DVD later that year), and it included a new featurette titled "We Need a Blockbuster, Charlie Brown". A Blu-ray/DVD combo pack was released on September 7, 2010 with the same features as the Warner DVD.

External links

• It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown at the Internet Movie Database