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Encyclopedia > Christmas television special

American television

In American television, a Christmas television special is typically a one-time, half-hour program aired during the Christmas season. Some are extended episodes of currently running television series featuring the regular characters dealing with Christmas. Some specials are of a more variety show nature, featuring celebrities and/or singers and musical numbers and short skits. Many are animated cartoon productions aimed at children, intended to be outgrown by one generation and picked up by a new generation of children. Christmas or Christmas Day is a holiday celebrating the birth of Jesus, the central figure of Christianity. ... A television special is a television program, typically a short film or television movie intended to debut in prime time, the term used to define any television program which interrupts or temporarily replaces programming normally scheduled for a given time slot. ... A variety show is a show with a variety of acts, often including music and comedy skits, especially on television. ... An animated cartoon is a short, hand-drawn (or made with computers to look similar to something hand-drawn) film for the cinema, television or computer screen, featuring some kind of story or plot (even if it is a very short one). ...


All such specials are naturally strongly Christmas-themed, but usually forgo the religious aspects of the holiday to concentrate on more general themes of giving, and goodwill towards others. Such secular icons of the season as Santa Claus often figure prominently in these specials as well. For other uses, see Santa Claus (disambiguation). ...


Christmas television specials are also where non-animated characters from other media may first cross over into animation; examples include the Peanuts comic strip, the Bloom County comic strip, and the Dr. Seuss children's book How the Grinch Stole Christmas. The first episode of The Simpsons (1989) was a Christmas special, also known as "Simpsons Roasting on an Open Fire." Peanuts book cover Peanuts was a syndicated comic strip written and drawn by American cartoonist Charles M. Schulz. ... The cover of the first best-selling Bloom County collection, featuring several of its main characters: (left to right) Milo Bloom, Opus, Cutter John, Bill the Cat, Michael Binkley, Portney and Hodge Podge. ... ... How the Grinch Stole Christmas! is one of the best-known childrens books by Dr. Seuss. ... The Simpsons is an Emmy and Peabody Award-winning American animated sitcom created by Matt Groening for the Fox Network, becoming one of the first hits for the network, and is one of the most successful and critically acclaimed television shows ever produced. ... Simpsons Roasting on an Open Fire, also known as The Simpsons Christmas Special was the first episode of the half-hour length Simpsons series to air, though it was the eighth episode produced in season one. ...


The Rankin-Bass animation studio is well known for its many holiday specials, including the stop-motion Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, which CBS has shown annually since 1964, and the animated Frosty the Snowman. Rankin-Bass (aka Videocraft International) is an American production company, known for its seasonal television specials. ... Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer is a long-running Christmas television special produced in stop motion animation by Rankin-Bass. ... CBS (an abbreviation for Columbia Broadcasting System, its former legal name) is one of the largest television networks, and formerly one of the largest radio networks, in the United States. ... Frosty the Snowman is a popular Christmas song written by Steve Jack Rollins and Steve Nelson in 1950. ...


British television

In British television, a Christmas special is a one-off episode of a regular television series which may not otherwise be running in the winter or even that year, as in Britain television series tend to run on limited schedules of 6 to 13 episodes rather than year-round. Successive series of a program may run in non-consecutive years so a Christmas special may be of a series for which no other episodes have aired that year (or possibly for several years). British television broadcasting has a range of different broadcasters, broadcasting multiple channels over a variety of distribution media. ...


A Christmas special may or may not have a Christmas theme and often is not even set during the Christmas season but usually runs on Christmas day itself and is often longer than a regular episode of the series. There are noticeable patterns in Christmas specials, particularly in dramas and sitcoms, whereby the characters either have to endure Christmas Day in a typically unfestive manner (and thus allowing the writers to include plenty of clichés associated with the season), or they are taken out of their environment and go on holiday to an exotic location - an idea which can also occur in spin-off films.


Some examples include:

Morecambe and Wise Morecambe and Wise were a famous British comic double act comprising Eric Morecambe OBE and Ernie Wise OBE. The act lasted four decades until Morecambes retirement, shortly before his death in 1984. ... The Office is a British television comedy series, created, written and directed by Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant, and first aired in the UK on BBC Two on July 9, 2001. ... Doctor Who is a long-running British science fiction television programme produced by the BBC about a mysterious time-travelling adventurer known as The Doctor, who explores time and space with his companions, fighting evil. ... The Christmas Invasion is a 60-minute special episode of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who. ... Thomas the Tank Engine and Friends is a childrens television series about the engines and other characters working on the railways of the Island of Sodor, and is based on The Railway Series. ... Father Ted is a popular 1990s television situation comedy set around the lives of three priests on the fictional extremely remote Craggy Island off the west coast of Ireland. ... Father Ted is a popular 1990s television situation comedy set around the lives of three priests on the fictional extremely remote Craggy Island off the west coast of Ireland. ... Blackadder in Blackadders Christmas Carol Blackadders Christmas Carol (1988) is a one-off episode of Blackadder, a parody of Charles Dickens A Christmas Carol. ... Only Fools and Horses was a long-running British television sit-com, created and written by John Sullivan, and made and broadcast by the BBC. Seven series were broadcast between 1981 and 1991, with sporadic Christmas specials until 2003. ... The Vicar of Dibley is a British sitcom created by Richard Curtis, and mostly written by Curtis and Paul Mayhew-Archer. ... Wallace and Gromit are the main characters in a series of three British animated films by Nick Park of Aardman Animations. ...

Examples of American Christmas television specials


  Results from FactBites:
 
Christmas television special - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (995 words)
Christmas television specials are also where non-animated characters from other media may first cross over into animation; examples include the Peanuts comic strip, the Bloom County comic strip, and the Dr.
In British television, a Christmas special is a one-off episode of a regular television series which may not otherwise be running in the winter or even that year, as in Britain television series tend to run on limited schedules of 6 to 13 episodes rather than year-round.
The Beverly Hillbillies: Christmas at the Clampetts (1963)
Christmas: Definition and Much More from Answers.com (6437 words)
Christmas began to acquire its associations with an increasingly secularized holiday of gift-giving and good cheer, a view that was popularized in works such as Clement Clarke Moore's poem “A Visit from St. Nicholas” (1823) and Charles Dickens's story A Christmas Carol (1843).
The phrase "Christmas tree" is first recorded in 1835 and represents the importation of a tradition from Germany, where such trees became popular in the late 18th century.
Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol is the tale of curmudgeonly miser Ebenezer Scrooge.
  More results at FactBites »


 

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