{"id":21310,"date":"2023-12-11T11:00:00","date_gmt":"2023-12-11T19:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/?p=21310"},"modified":"2024-03-02T21:15:45","modified_gmt":"2024-03-03T05:15:45","slug":"rude-epiphanies-christmas-songs-cinematic-origins","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/rude-epiphanies-christmas-songs-cinematic-origins\/","title":{"rendered":"Rude Epiphanies: Christmas Songs\u2019 Cinematic Origins"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

This week, we\u2019ll be focusing our posts on holiday movies, including several that we feel are worth putting into your holiday viewing rotation this year. Follow along here<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a Festivus miracle!\u201d \u2014 Cosmo Kramer, Seinfeld<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Unlike regular pop songs, whose origins are widely known and celebrated, Christmas carols tend to exist on a different historical plane. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

There\u2019s something magical about holiday tunes \u2014 particularly those written before 1955 \u2014 that numerous people can conjure up on a moment\u2019s notice without the aid of lyrics or sheet music, suggesting these compositions have been around since time immemorial and have worked their way into our DNA. Perhaps they arose through something akin to a virgin birth, or at the very least came about via purely altruistic circumstances, possibly to help fund a children\u2019s hospital or an orphanage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Such naivet\u00e9 has its place and time, but the longer us bags of bones inhabit this third rock from the sun, the more it becomes clear that many beloved Christmas songs weren\u2019t immaculate conceptions \u2013 but were actually written for movies. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Having these bubbles burst can certainly be a bummer, yet learning about famous carols\u2019 roots can lead to a greater understanding of the films and the songs themselves, as well as a more honest and merry holiday season. And with such shamelessly cynical awakenings as the use of \u201cSilver Bells\u201d in Sidney Lanfield\u2019s The Lemon Drop Kid<\/em>, those lessons are bound to stick.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In order to pay off a $10,000 debt to gangster Moose Moran (Fred Clark) by Christmas Eve on penalty of death, the eponymous con artist (Bob Hope) recruits various unsavory associates to dress as Santa Claus and collect \u201cdonations\u201d for his hastily-established \u201ccharitable organization,\u201d the Nellie Thursday Home For Old Dolls \u2014 a retirement home named in honor of his fellow grifter (Jane Darwell).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Making the most of his booze-soaked gruff tenor, a Santa-suited Gloomy Willie (William Frawley) hashes out a blunt, honest version of the tune: \u201cSilver bells, silver bells\/Let\u2019s put some dough in the kitty\/Chunk it in, chunk it in\/Or Sandy will give you a mickey.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Horrified, The Kid notes that it\u2019s \u201cvulgar\u201d to mention money at Christmas and instructs Willie that a lighter touch is necessary to appeal to passersby\u2019s sentiments. With his on-again, off-again squeeze Brainey Baxter (Marilyn Maxwell) on his arm, The Kid walks around with a kettle and the duo\u2019s kinder, gentler lyrics bring in the dough with magnetic success.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Framed in its cinematic origins, the nostalgic charms of \u201cSilver Bells\u201d quickly lose their luster as The Kid and Brainey employ it to loosen willing pedestrians from their cash. It\u2019s a bizarre sequence, and while coming to terms with the song\u2019s history, viewers must also contend with some not-so-casual racism. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

When two young Chinese boys emerge onto the street from a hand laundry establishment and contribute an innocent \u201cring-a-ling\u201d to the chorus, The Kid taps them on the head \u2014 accompanied by wood-block foley \u2014 and sings a cringe-worthy line of Asian-accented sounds. Not to be left out, an Italian man standing outside the adjoining shop with his wife adds a quick, stereotypically inflected fill, and around the corner The Kid addresses a German Santa with yet another accented aside.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Despite the head-spinning that the whole scene incites, Lanfield directs the action as if his characters inhabit an intricately decorated snow globe, pulling back with a crane shot of the festive street and then to a view of (a fairly convincing miniature of) NYC that heightens the production\u2019s majesty. Such moments suggest a purer appreciation for the wonders of the season, but with practically everyone in the scene hawking something or carrying around a wrapped gift, and such lyrical fills as \u201cjust fill it up with loot\u201d (that mysteriously haven\u2019t been included by carolers over the years), the main objective seems to be demystify the rose-tinted glow.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The cinematic origins of \u201cWhite Christmas\u201d are less of a surprise, seeing as there\u2019s the Michael Curtiz film of the same name. By the time of its 1954 premiere, 12 years had passed since the song\u2019s introduction in Mark Sandrich\u2019s Holiday Inn<\/em>, which won writer Irving Berlin the Academy Award for Best Original Song.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Heartwarming as its lyrics and melody are (they\u2019re playing in your head now, right?), its function within Holiday Inn<\/em> is ultimately almost as bitter as \u201cSilver Bells\u201d in The Lemon Drop Kid<\/em>. No mere love letter to the season, the song is one of many that Jim Hardy (Bing Crosby) writes for his titular establishment on a Connecticut farm that\u2019s open only on holidays for \u201cdancing, entertainment [and] home cooking.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Its commercial roots aside, the number\u2019s initial rendition in a private moment between Jim and up-and-coming performer Linda Mason (Marjorie Reynolds) is innocent enough. But as Jim\u2019s venue becomes popular and Hollywood calls to make a film about it, Holiday Inn<\/em> turns starkly honest about people creating Christmas songs to make a buck.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One can\u2019t help but groan at the film\u2019s movie-within-the-movie, complete with a reconstructed Holiday Inn on a soundstage and fake snow falling from the rafters. Yet these sights are also a welcome reminder that we too are watching a movie conceived through such artificial means and complicit in the perpetuation of the seasonal money machine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

“Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas,\u201d however, is somewhat sneakier in its intentions. While only a portion of Vincente Minnelli\u2019s Meet Me in St. Louis <\/em>takes place on or around Dec. 25, to the extent that a Die Hard<\/em>-esque \u201cIs it really a Christmas movie?\u201d debate is warranted, its trademark song and the key role it plays have made the film\u2019s final-act moments its most enduring.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Though the narrative purpose of Hugh Martin\u2019s lyrics and Ralph Blane\u2019s music isn\u2019t explicitly in the service of its characters turning a profit, there\u2019s still a stench of capitalism in the air. Smith family breadwinner Alonzo (Leon Ames) gets a promotion and transfer from Missouri to New York City, and though his family protests having to relocate their lives right after Christmas, he makes it clear that they don\u2019t have much of a choice.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Upon returning home from becoming engaged to neighbor John Truett (Tom Drake) at a Christmas Eve ball, Esther Smith (Judy Garland) finds her kid sister Tootie (Margaret O\u2019Brien) waiting for Santa to show up, and worried that St. Nick won\u2019t be able to find their family the next year. With the now-familiar melody emanating from a hand-cranked music box, Esther attempts to cheer up her sibling with a song that\u2019s also honest about the hardships ahead.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Instead, “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas\u201d sends Tootie into a violent rage. Distraught that she can\u2019t bring the snowman family in the yard with them to Manhattan, the littlest Smith sprints outside and destroys Frosty & Co. \u2014 which simultaneously melts their father\u2019s heart and prompts him to keep the family in the Gateway to the West, thus starting the tradition of children wearing down their parents and getting their way at Christmas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While witnessing these three classic songs play out in their natural forms isn\u2019t exactly like watching the Zapruder film, they nevertheless prove revelatory. There\u2019s a sense of liberation in realizing that, like so many things in this world, they were crafted to earn a profit, and it makes sense that they were engineered to coincide with the biggest sales month for the majority of commercial enterprises.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That\u2019s not to say the shine is completely gone from these anthems. Similar to coming to terms with the fact that a certain holiday icon isn\u2019t real \u2014 yes, cat\u2019s out of the bag: Ebenezer Scrooge is a work of fiction \u2014 knowing the truth frees one up to more sustainably appreciate the holidays and their more fulfilling traditions, whether that\u2019s spending time with family, going caroling, or watching Christmas movies.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cSilver Bells,\u201d \u201cWhite Christmas,\u201d and \u201cHave Yourself a Merry Little Christmas\u201d may be seasonal favorites, but they didn\u2019t magically appear out of the holiday ether \u2014 all were originally written for movies. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":547,"featured_media":21312,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1399],"tags":[1799,1422],"class_list":["post-21310","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-looking-back","tag-christmas-week-2023","tag-looking-back"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21310","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/547"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21310"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21310\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22410,"href":"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21310\/revisions\/22410"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21312"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21310"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21310"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21310"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}