The Stingiest Man in Town - Classic Christmas Story Book for Holiday Reading | Perfect Gift for Book Lovers & Holiday Season

While this is mostly the Scrooge story that we all know so well, there are some nice ideas thrown in to make it stand out and work well in it's musical format. Because first and foremost, this is a musical. This special has more songs than any other work by Rankin/Bass, the whopping 11 songs include "Yes, There is a Santa Claus", "Birthday Party of the King", "One Little Boy, "Sing A Christmas Carol", "Merry Christmas Uncle Scrooge", "The Chain Song", "An Old Fashioned Christmas", "Song of the Christmas Spirit", "Listen to the Song of the Christmas Spirit", "Golden Dreams", "It Might Have Been", and of course the title song "The Stingiest Man in Town". Janice Tore wrote the lyrics, which is unusual, Jules Bass wrote the lyrics for most of the Rankin/Bass specials. Music supervision by Maury Laws, music arranged and conducted by Bernard Hoffer.Rankin/Bass studio made yet another hit holiday film with this television special that first aired on NBC on December 23, 1978 in a 1 hour format. Walter Matthau as Scrooge (his son Charles voiced the boy at the end), and Tom Bosley as B.A.H. Humbug the cricket, mostly a narrator. Dennis Day who stars as Fred, also did voice work in "Frosty's Winter Wonderland". The famous voice actor Paul Frees appears as the Ghost of Christmas Past. Robert Morse as Young Scrooge.Character design was by Paul Coker Jr (from MADA Magazine) who did design for almost every film by Rankin/Bass, both Animagic and traditional cel animation. The screenplay is by Romeo Muller, the most prolific writer at the studio. By the way, this was one of the most expensive efforts put on by the studio. While it did not reach the cost of a theatrical animated feature, the 150 person animation staff spent $1.5 million.This is a very nice film from the holiday entertainers of Rankin/Bass Studio and I highly recommend. Their studio brought us such memorable holiday classics such as Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer, Year without a Santa Claus, Nestor the Long-Eared Christmas Donkey, Mad Monster Party, The Little Drummer Boy, Frosty the Snowman, Santa Claus is Coming to Town, Mouse on the Mayflower, Here Comes Peter Cottontail, Cricket on the Hearth, Jack Frost, Pinnochio's Christmas, Rudolph's Shiny New Year, the First Easter Bunny. They also made non-holiday films such as the Hobbit, Flight of Dragons, the Last Unicorn. It is incredible that one company is responsible for all those TV specials, 95% of the ones we see every year. Their work includes standard animation, stop-motion Animagic, and live action. UPDATE: Good news, this is now on DVD, a box set called Classic Christmas Favorites includes this classic as one 10 terrific holiday stories in the box set. The release if from Warner Brothers and 9 of the shows are Rankin/Bass, while the other is the Grinch. Great value on this set, it also has the rare "Leprechauns Christmas Carol". The picture and sound appear to be restored, I highly recommend! To see more Rankin/Bass Christmas titles, see my list at Amazon.com titled "Complete list of Rankin/Bass Studios Christmas movies"