''Frosty's Winter Wonderland'' is a 1976

animated Animation is a filmmaking technique whereby image, still images are manipulated to create Motion picture, moving images. In traditional animation, images are drawn or painted by hand on cel, transparent celluloid sheets to be photographed and e ...

Christmas television special Christmas themes have long been an inspiration to artists and writers. A prominent aspect of Christian media, the topic first appeared in literature and in music. Filmmakers have picked up on this wealth of material, with both adaptations of Ch ...

and a

standalone sequel A sequel is a work of literature, film, theatre, television, music, or video game that continues the story of, or expands upon, some earlier work. In the common context of a narrative work of fiction, a sequel portrays events set in the same ...

to the 1969 special ''

Frosty the Snowman "Frosty the Snowman" is a song written by Walter "Jack" Rollins and Steve Nelson, and first recorded by Gene Autry and the Cass County Boys in 1950 and later recorded by Jimmy Durante in that year. It was written after the success of Autry's ...

'', produced by

Rankin/Bass Productions Rankin/Bass Animated Entertainment (founded and formerly known as Videocraft International, Ltd. and Rankin/Bass Productions, Inc.) was an American production company located in New York City. It was known for its seasonal television specials, ...

and animated by

Topcraft Topcraft Co., Ltd. (株式会社トップクラフト ''Kabushiki-gaisha Toppukurafuto'', also written as "Top Craft") was an animation studio established in 1972, by former Toei Animation producer Toru Hara, and located in Tokyo, Japan. It was f ...

. It is the second television special featuring the character Frosty the Snowman. It returns writer Romeo Muller, character designer Paul Coker, Jr., music composer Maury Laws and actor Jackie Vernon as the voice of Frosty, while

Andy Griffith Andy Samuel Griffith (June 1, 1926 – July 3, 2012) was an American actor, comedian, television producer, singer, and writer whose career spanned seven decades in music and television. Known for his Southern drawl, his characters with a folksy ...

stars as the narrator (replacing

Jimmy Durante James Francis Durante ( , ; February 10, 1893 – January 29, 1980) was an American comedian, actor, singer, and pianist. His distinctive gravelly speech, Lower East Side New York accent, accent, comic language-butchery, jazz-influenced son ...

, who had been incapacitated by a stroke three years prior and retired from acting) with the rest of the cast consisting of

Shelley Winters Shelley Winters (born Shirley Schrift; August 18, 1920 – January 14, 2006) was an American film actress whose career spanned seven decades. She won Academy Awards for ''The Diary of Anne Frank (1959 film), The Diary of Anne Frank'' (1959) and ' ...

Dennis Day Dennis Day (born Owen Patrick Eugene McNulty; May 21, 1916 – June 22, 1988) was an American actor, comedian and singer. He was of Irish descent. Early life Day was born and raised in the Throggs Neck Clason Point section of Bronx in New Yor ...

and

Paul Frees Solomon Hersh Frees (June 22, 1920November 2, 1986), better known as Paul Frees, was an American actor, comedian, impressionist, and vaudevillian. He is known for his work on Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Walter Lantz, Rankin/Bass and Walt Disney the ...

. The special premiered on ABC on December 2, 1976.

Plot

Years have passed since Frosty left for the North Pole. When he hears about the first snowfall of the season, he decides to return. The children are overjoyed when Frosty comes back to play with them, but then Jack Frost sees the fun that the children are having with Frosty and becomes jealous of him. When he learns about Frosty and his magic hat which brought him to life, he decides to steal it from Frosty so the children will love him more. But that night, while Frosty and the children are ice-skating at a frozen pond, Jack unknowingly captures a horse's hat with his ability to blow snowy winds. Believing it to be Frosty's top hat, he disappears with it. Despite the fun he has, Frosty feels lonely when the children go home each night. To cheer him up, the children decide Frosty needs a wife and they build him one the next day, naming her Crystal. However, the group cannot find a way to bring her to life. Late that night, Frosty presents Crystal with a bouquet of frost flowers, and his gift of love brings her to life. Just then, Jack uses a gust of icy wind to blow Frosty's hat off, rendering him lifeless. Crystal makes a corsage out of snow, places it on Frosty's chest and gives him a kiss, bringing him back to life. Befuddled by Frosty's reanimation, Jack throws the hat back onto his head. Frosty and Crystal run through the town and announce their wedding plans to the children. Parson Brown, the local preacher, assists the children in building a snow parson whom he brings to life with his Bible. When Jack tries to spoil the wedding with a blizzard, Frosty and Crystal reason with him and ask for him to be the best man at the wedding. Jack agrees, and Frosty and Crystal are married. Frosty, Crystal, and Jack have fun with the children all winter, but they notice the weather is starting to grow warm. Jack uses his powers to extend the winter. After Parson Brown warns them about the dangers of everlasting snow, the three decide to return to the North Pole. They skate to the train station where Frosty meets the Traffic Cop he encountered before and introduces him to his wife which surprises him. At the train station, Frosty and Crystal bid farewell to the children. Months pass and the land becomes a winter wonderland again.

Cast

* Jackie Vernon as Frosty *

as Crystal (also credited as Mrs. Frosty) *

as the narrator *

as: ** Parson Brown ** Snow Parson *

as: ** Jack Frost ** Traffic Cop * Shelly Hines as Elsie * Manfreed Olea as a Child * Eric Stern as a Child * Barbara Jo Ewing as a Child * The Wee Winter Singers as Children

Production credits

* Producers/Directors – Arthur Rankin Jr.,

Jules Bass Julius Caesar Bass (; September 16, 1935 – October 25, 2022) was an American director, producer, lyricist, composer and author. Until 1960, he worked at a New York advertising agency, and then co-founded the film production company Videocraft ...

* Writer – Romeo Muller * Based on the Song "

Winter Wonderland "Winter Wonderland" is a song written in 1934 by Felix Bernard and lyricist Richard Bernhard Smith. Due to its seasonal theme, it is often regarded as a Christmas song in the Northern Hemisphere. Since its original recording by Richard Himb ...

" – Dick Smith,

Felix Bernard Felix William Bernard (April 28, 1897 – October 20, 1944) was an American conductor, pianist and a composer of popular music. His writing credits include the popular songs "Winter Wonderland" (with lyricist Richard Bernhard Smith) and "Dardanel ...

© 1934 Bregman Vocco and Conn, Inc. * Sound – John Curcio, Don Hahn, Dave Iveland, Tom Clack * Animation – Toru Hara, Tsuguyuki Kubo * Key Animation – Kazuyuki Kobayashi * Background Design – Minoru Nishida * Design – Paul Coker, Jr. * Music Arranger/Conductor – Maury Laws Rankin/Bass Productions, Inc. All rights reserved. ©MCMLXXVI.

Television rights

The rights to this special are held by Warner Bros. Television Distribution via

Telepictures Telepictures (also known as Telepictures Productions; formerly known as Telepictures Distribution and Telepictures Corporation) is an American television show and filmmaking company, currently operating as a subsidiary of Warner Bros. Entertainmen ...

, which used to license the show to Freeform. The latter aired the special annually on its " 25 Days of Christmas" marathon. In 2018,

AMC AMC may refer to: Film and television * AMC Theatres, an American movie theater chain * AMC Networks, an American entertainment company ** AMC (TV channel) ** AMC+, streaming service ** AMC Networks International, an entertainment company *** ...

took over the license for the special. Because the ownership of the television rights to the Rankin/Bass library was split into two parts (one including all productions prior to September 1974 and one including all productions from that point onward) after the company's dissolution in 1987, ''Frosty's Winter Wonderland'' was separated from the original ''Frosty the Snowman'' special. As a result,

CBS CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS (an abbreviation of its original name, Columbia Broadcasting System), is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainme ...

, the longtime broadcast rights holder to the original special, produced a companion sequel of its own, '' Frosty Returns'', with a totally different cast, style and production staff. Today, the broadcast rights to the original are held by

NBC The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the NBC Entertainment division of NBCUniversal, a subsidiary of Comcast. It is one of NBCUniversal's ...

, a sister company of the pre-September 1974 Rankin-Bass library owner,

DreamWorks Classics DreamWorks Classics is an American entertainment company owned by DreamWorks Animation, a subsidiary of Universal Pictures, a division of NBCUniversal, which in turn is a subsidiary of Comcast. Founded as Classic Media in 2000 by Eric Ellenboge ...

Home media

''Frosty's Winter Wonderland'' was first released on a compilation

VHS tape VHS (Video Home System) is a discontinued standard for consumer-level analog video recording on tape cassettes, introduced in 1976 by JVC. It was the dominant home video format throughout the tape media period of the 1980s and 1990s. Mag ...

with the 1981 special '' The Leprechauns' Christmas Gold'' by

Vestron Video Vestron Video was the main subsidiary of Vestron, Inc., a home video company based in Stamford, Connecticut, that was active from 1981 to 1993, and is considered to have been a pioneer in the home video market. The name is now used for a collecto ...

's Lightning Video label in 1985. The same double-feature release was also available in Australia in 1989.

Warner Home Video Warner Bros. Discovery Home Entertainment, Inc. (doing business as Warner Bros. Home Entertainment; formerly known as Warner Home Video and WCI Home Video and sometimes credited as Warner Home Entertainment) is the American home video distribution ...

/ Warner Bros. Family Entertainment (which owned the post-September 1974 Rankin/Bass Productions library via

) distributed the special for its second VHS release in 1992, and also released it on

DVD The DVD (common abbreviation for digital video disc or digital versatile disc) is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 1995 and first released on November 1, 1996, in Japan. The medium can store any ki ...

in 2004 paired with the 1974 special '' 'Twas the Night Before Christmas''. The DVD was re-released in 2011 & 2022 respectively.

Culture

In the 1998

Warner Bros. Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. (WBEI), commonly known as Warner Bros. (WB), is an American filmed entertainment studio headquartered at the Warner Bros. Studios complex in Burbank, California and the main namesake subsidiary of Warner Bro ...

film '' Jack Frost'', Charlie Frost ( Joseph Cross) shows his father Jack Frost (

Michael Keaton Michael John Douglas (born September 5, 1951), known professionally as Michael Keaton, is an American actor. He has received numerous accolades, including a Primetime Emmy Award and two Golden Globe Awards, in addition to nominations for an Aca ...

) some scenes from the special while changing television channels.

Notes

References

External links