In the 53 years since its debut, the animated special has become a holiday classic. Photo / Supplied
In the 53 years since its debut, the animated special has become a holiday classic. Photo / Supplied
The 1966 television adaptation of the book How the Grinch Stole Christmas! spawned movies, musicals and merchandise. It has endured with fans.
On December 18, 1966, How the Grinch Stole Christmas! debuted on CBS. Based on the beloved book about a neon beast with a stingy heart, the animated specialwas dismissed as a trifle.
Some lauded the animation and Boris Karloff's throaty narration as the Grinch. Others panned it as a morality tale that paled when compared to the book written by Theodor Geisel, better known as Dr. Seuss. The New York Times was among those, calling it a "creation that should be left undisturbed on the printed page."
But in the more than 50 years since its debut, the animated special, directed by Chuck Jones and Ben Washam, has become a holiday classic and turned into a live-action movie, a Broadway musical, an updated animated film and a retailer's fever dream of pantookas, fuzzle fuzz and fliffer bloofs.
In recent years, critics wholly embraced the original, giving it stellar reviews. (It has a 100 per cent rating on Rotten Tomatoes.) And the story's popularity persists in reruns, touring shows and as a merchandising juggernaut. So much so, this year it inspired the title of a pulp romance novel.
The Times has chronicled the many iterations of the Grinch over the years. The book, which was published in 1957, was inspired by a Redbook article by Dr. Seuss that came out the same year. But the story, with its feel-good message of kindness over consumerism, gained a wider audience on television in the 1960s when a surge of animated Christmas specials were aired.
Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer premiered in 1964, created by Rankin/Bass Productions, a popular animation company that used three-dimensional puppets. A year later, A Charlie Brown Christmas became the first special to feature characters from the Peanuts comic strip. Rankin/Bass produced other animated classics, including 1968's The Little Drummer Boy and 1969's Frosty the Snowman, which was drawn by hand.
But it is How the Grinch Stole Christmas! that has had the most vibrant life, in part because of its secular message of togetherness. It tells the story of a furry, green beast who dressed as Santa Claus in a bid to scuttle Christmas in the village of Whoville. Despite his best efforts, the villagers prevailed and embraced him, particularly Cindy Lou Who, who caught the beast trying to stuff her family's Christmas tree up a chimney.
Illustrated with spare line drawings, the book left much to the imagination. Not so with later movies. In 2000, Jim Carrey starred in a Technicolor extravaganza in which the characters seemed as wobbly as the story itself. Critic Stephen Holden of The New York Times described the movie then as "a depressing reminder that when Hollywood decides to lavish more than US$100 million on a beloved children's story, that money has to go somewhere."
He called Carrey, who starred as the Grinch, "relentless." Worse, he wrote, there were the over-the-top theatrics. The set, for one, was strung with 52,000 Christmas lights. "The movie is so clogged with kooky gadgetry and special effects and glitter and goo that watching it feels like being gridlocked at Toys R Us during the Christmas rush," Holden wrote.
The musical version that hit Broadway in 2006 fared a little better with Times critics, but not much. "At about 90 minutes the stage version suffers from a milder case of bloat," Charles Isherwood wrote of the play. He called the musical "pleasing." Still, he scoffed at its consumerist underpinnings. Never mind that the story is grounded in community and good cheer — the musical adaptation was sponsored by Target.
"That this edifying bit of wisdom is now being promulgated by a retail giant is just one of the merry paradoxes of our age," Isherwood wrote. "Perhaps the vendors flogging US$20 Grinch dolls in the theatre's aisles were doing so with tongues in cheek."
Last year, Illumination, the makers of the Despicable Me franchise, created an animated version of How the Grinch Stole Christmas! This time, critics were more forgiving. There was little talk of consumerism. The Grinch's dog, Max, had charm. Mostly, though, the film, which starred Benedict Cumberbatch as the Grinch, was described as bland.
Nothing, it seemed, would compare to the 1966 television special. Or, as Isherwood put it back in 2006, "If there is a more wholly satisfying half-hour of entertainment to be had in our dark world, I'd like to know what it is."
