I Like It!

 Speaking of 1970's "Scrooge" (which is a musical) here's a fun print:

I'm sure the Ghost of Christmas Present would love one - if he had a wall on which to hang it!

If so, he can buy it here.

Yes, It Is!

 I don't think I've seen a poster with this tagline before:

They're right, though. It is a musical!

Happy Valentine's Day!

 

Finney!

 This is cool:

Merry Christmas!

TV!

Here's a 1974 ad for (I believe) the first time that "Scrooge," the 1970 Albert Finney musical, was shown on TV:

I remember it being kind of a big deal at the time!

"The Beautiful Day/Thank You Very Much" - Peter Reilly (1971)

"The Beautiful Day/Thank You Very Much" (1971)

Peter Reilly

Kiwi Records

What do you suppose this contemporary cover of "The Beautiful Day/Thank You Very Much" medley of songs from 1970's "Scrooge" sounds like?

This is an obscure New Zealand release on the aptly named Kiwi Records.

The cover photo looks like if Tiny Tim were a New Zealander hobo!

"The Beautiful Day" - Ricky Beaumont (1971)

"The Beautiful Day" (1971)
Ricky Beaumont

CBS Records

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.

"I'll Begin Again" - Jim Nabors (1970)

"I'll Begin Again" (1970)

Jim Nabors

Columbia Records

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!

"I'll Begin Again" - Sammy Davis, Jr. (1972)

"I'll Begin Again" (1972)

Now

Sammy Davis, Jr.

MGM Records

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!

"I'll Begin Again" - Tony Bennett (1971)

"I'll Begin Again" (1971)

Tony Bennett 

Columbia Records

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!

"Thank You Very Much" - Henry Mancini and his Orchestra and Chorus (1971)

"Thank You Very Much" (1971)

Mancini Plays the Theme from "Love Story"

Henry Mancini and his Orchestra and Chorus

RCA Victor

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."

Give it a listen:

Guest critic Betty Rubble sums up this cut:

"You... You/Once Upon a December" - Michael Chertock (1998)

"You... You/Once Upon a December" (1998)

Christmas at the Movies

Michael Chertock

Telarc

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!

In any event, give it a listen:

Ronald Searle Wrap-Up

So, Ronald Searle had an interesting take on illustrating the work of Charles Dickens, but I think his artwork is a lot of fun. Not the definitive versions, but a welcome breath of fresh air.

I started taking a closer look at his work because Darrell Van Citters mentioned in his book "Mister Magoo's Christmas Carol, The Making of the First Animated Christmas Special" that Searle's illustrations from the 1961 edition of "A Christmas Carol" influenced some of the character designs in that special.

He specifically mentions the fiddler at Fezziwig's Christmas party:

You can definitely see that the fiddler from the special is a streamlined, UPA-ized version of the one from the book.

You can read more about this in this post from Darrell's blog:

Ronald Searle and Mr. Magoo's Christmas Carol

He doesn't mention the "plunderers" but I think there are similarities there too. The cartoon version of Old Joe also has an eye patch and the characters in the book seem like they're doing a little dance number:

There's also a connection between Ronald Searle and another well-regarded version of "A Christmas Carol" (sort of):

Perhaps Searle's most famous work is his 1946-1952 British comic strip "St. Trinians's" which led to a series of movies. A couple of said movies featured Alastair Sim and George Cole, the respective old and young Scrooges of 1951's "Scrooge." 

Kind of fun!

Ronald Searle Illustrations for "Scrooge" (1970) - Part 2

The artwork by Ronald Searle that was featured in the opening credits of 1970's "Scrooge" is certainly striking.

But what did Searle himself think? Well, here's an interesting video on the making of the film featuring some comments by the artist:

And here's another video incorporating some of the above video, plus additional artwork and the credits themselves:

I find Ronald Searle's comments fascinating. It sounds like he didn't really like illustrating Dickens, although he did it quite a bit. Did he think he was not successful?

And he calls out John Leach and Arthur Rackham!

Hmmm...

Oh, and there was also a book version of the movie with additional Searle illustrations (see cover at top of page)!

Ronald Searle Illustrations for "Scrooge" (1970) - Part 1

We continue to stalk the work of British artist Ronald Searle with his illustrations for the main titles of 1970's "Scrooge" starring Albert Finney.

I remember thinking the credits were very striking when I first saw this movie so many years ago.

The advent of home video and the the internet have given us the option to take a closer look.

There are several illustrations used, some of which had multiple credits. For example, Edith Evans and Kenneth More shared the same one.

Here's each illustration:

Then the last one fades into live action:

Great work!

"A Christmas Carol" All-Star Team - Day 20

Our All-Star Team continues to grow with the addition of one more supernatural visitor - the ghost of Jacob Marley!

Marley's Ghost looms very large as he (it?) sets everything in motion with his visit to Ebenezer Scrooge on Christmas Eve.

Every adaptation has a Marley's Ghost in it and there are a lot of good ones, but which makes the cut?

It's Alec Guinness in the 1970 musical film "Scrooge" starring Albert Finney:

Befitting his stature, Alec Guinness gets a fair amount of screen time with a song ("See the Phantoms") plus a rare extra scene in the Christmas Yet to Come segment:

He makes the most of it and adds another memorable portrayal to his long list of credits!