We hang around the soundtrack of the 1970 movie musical version of "Scrooge" to take in this fun Japanese picture sleeve:
The A-side is "The Beautiful Day," as sung by Richard "Ricky" Beaumont in the role of Tiny Tim.
That's just a quick little song, clocking in at just under two minutes.
What's interesting is that the Oscar-nominated song "Thank You Very Much" is relegated to the B-side! I think most people agree that this is the most memorable song from the picture, or at least Henry Mancini thought so!
This all makes me wonder what Japanese audiences thought/think of "Scrooge" and "A Christmas Carol" in general.
Could it possibly be anywhere near as ingrained in Japan's popular culture as it is in the U.S. and U.K.?
Whatever they thought if this record, I'm sure they did dig the cut "Scrooge" from "The Ventures' Christmas Album (discussed here), as the Ventures with their instrumentals were very popular in Japan.
We give one more version of "I'll Begin Again" from Leslie Bricusse's score for the 1970 movie "Scrooge," this time by Jim Nabors!
Columbia Records released the song as a single from the album "For the Good Times - The Jim Nabors Hour" in 1970.
Give it a listen:
The subtitle of the album is a tie-in to Jim's 1969-1971 TV variety series, which succeeded his popular sitcom "Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C." which had run from 1964-1969. It sounds like they added some applause to studio tracks to make them seem live.
I always thought Jim Nabors was a fascinating show biz figure, with his big, booming singing voice at odds with his goofy comedy persona.
I especially enjoyed his work on "The Andy Griffith Show," where his Gomer Pyle was a surreal side character.
I just recently saw him as a guest star on a 1976 episode of "The Muppet Show" (thankfully streaming now on Disney+) and he was extremely likable and seemed like a good sport, not shying away from his Gomer Pyle roots.
My grandmother did not like "Gomer Pyle" at all, but she loved Jim Nabors's singing. I think she had all of his albums - and he had a ton of them!
As mentioned last time, Sammy Davis, Jr. recorded a version of the Leslie Bricusse song "I'll Begin Again" from the 1970 movie "Scrooge."
Here it is, from his 1972 album "Now":
This particular album is noteworthy for featuring Sammy's astonishingly popular hit single of "The Candy Man," which was another Leslie Bricusse song this one co-written with Anthony Newley and from the movie "Willie Wonka & the Chocolate Factory" (1971).
The flipside of "The Candy Man" was "I Want to Be Happy," a standard that first appeared in the Broadway show "No, No, Nannette" in 1925. What's interesting is that Tony Bennett included the song on his "Love Story" album. So, Tony Bennett and Sammy Davis, Jr. each had albums within a year of each other that contained both "I'll Begin Again" and "I Want to Be Happy." Hmmm...
Sammy's "I'll Begin Again" also appeared on this single from 1971:
But apparently his Ecology label for Motown didn't go anywhere and some tracks he had recorded for an unreleased album wound up over at MGM.
When I was a kid, it seemed that Sammy Davis, Jr. was everywhere. He popped up on every TV show in the manner of those famous-for-being-famous celebrities so prevalent in the 1970s.
As I got older, however, I came to appreciate the depth of his talent, which was astonishing.
In addition to singing and dancing, he could act and was a brilliant impressionist.
He handles songs like "I'll Begin Again" quite easily, but that's only the tip of his iceberg!
Another song from Leslie Bricusse's score from the 1970 movie musical "Scrooge" to get some other recordings is "I'll Begin Again," the song that Albert Finney sings/croaks toward the end of the film.
Tony Bennett had a single of the tune on Columbia Records in 1971.
Give it a listen:
I think this song suits Tony very well. He had already become more of a song stylist by this point, not exactly talk-singing, but sort of. Hard to believe this was 50 years ago and he only just retired.
I saw that he recently revealed that he's been battling Alzheimer's Disease for a few years. I hope he gets to enjoy retirement for a while. He's pleased a lot of people for a lot of years!
There were also versions of "I'll Begin Again" by Sammy Davis, Jr. on MGM Records and Jim Nabors, Tony Bennett's Columbia labelmate.
Tony's version of was also included on his "Love Story" album à la Henry Mancini and "Love Story" was the flipside of the single. "Love Story" was a minor hit for Tony.
The "adult contemporary" artists of the day did a lot of the same songs. Andy Williams never got in the "Scrooge" act, though!
We stay with the "Scrooge" (1970) soundtrack with this version of the Oscar-nominated "Thank You Very Much" by Henry Mancini from 1971.
Henry Mancini was, of course, a top composer for movies and TV, with credits including the memeorabke themes from the "Peter Gunn" TV series and "The Pink Panther" films, but he also recorded a lot of songs from movies that he didn't write.
He had a number one hit with "LOve Theme from Romeo and Juliet" in 1969 and another hit with "LOve Story" in 1971.
He also recorded tons of albims from for RCA Victor, so it's no surprise that he had an album called "Mancini Plays the Theme from 'Love Story'" in 1971.
The album featured popular songs from recent movies, including Leslie Bricusse's "Thank you Very Much" from the previous year's "Scrooge."
Here's a cut from the 1998 album "Christmas at the Movies" by pianist Michael Chertock.
I've had the CD since it first came out and it's really nice, but due to my OSD, this particular track has always been my favorite because it features the song "You... You" from the 1970 musical version of "Scrooge."
This haunting song by Leslie Bricusse is kinda/sorta "sung" by Albert Finney while thinking about his lost love.
It's mashed up here with the similar sounding "Once Upon a December" from the 1997 animated feature "Anastasia."
An interesting tie-in with this song is that the lyrics (not heard here) are by Lynn Ahrens, who also wrote the lyrics for "A Christmas Carol: The Musical." Throw in that Kelsey Grammer who played Scrooge in the TV-movie of that musical also does voicework in "Anastasia" and you come back around again!
Scrooge (1970) Director: Ronald Neame Scrooge: Albert Finney
OK, now we're moving on to something that deserves more virtual ink
than those last couple of things: the big budget musical "Scrooge" from
1970 starring Albert Finney.
Here's a trailer, which I think is more dated than the movie itself:
Full disclosure: This
was the first adaptation I remember seeing way back in the day. I
thought it was great and even had the soundtrack album, which I played
all the time!
Nostalgia aside, does it hold up? Of course I'm going to say yes!
The
first thing you need for a successful adaptation is a Scrooge who can
really carry the show. I think Albert Finney does a great job in the
role. He seems to really throw himself into the role and has an awesome
"look" as Scrooge.
With a musical that's more of a
drama than a comedy, you want songs that fit in naturally, rather than
having the story come to a stop, have a big number, the more story, etc.
I think they succeed here.
The first thing I think to
compare this adaptation to is "Mister Magoo's Christmas Carol," and the
songs here probably don't reach that high standard, but they work as
part of the whole.
A little context shows why this got
green-lighted back in 1970 or so. "Oliver!" (1968) had just won a bunch
of Oscars, including Best Picture. When would the time be better for
another musical adaptation of a Dickens work, and his most popular at
that? Throw in the breakout star of another Oscar winning British period
piece, "Tom Jones" (1963), and you're onto something!
The
songs and screenplay are by Leslie Bricusse, who was on an interesting
run of musical adaptations. He had recently worked on "Doctor Doolittle"
(1967) and "Lost Horizon" (1969) and had "Willy Wonka & the
Chocolate Factory" (1971) the next year.
So, with these elements in place, what did we wind up with?
