Richard Williams - Abe Levitow "A Christmas Carol"

Here is a cel from my collection.  It is of the Ghost of Christmas Present from the Richard William's adaptation of "A Christmas Carol" which was made in 1971 and won the Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film .  It was originally aired on television as a half-hour Special (back in the days when television networks still commissioned high-end Christmas Specials and they were actually Special) .   

I had this cel for many years after purchasing it at an ASIFA cel sale in Hollywood .   When Richard Williams came through the Orlando Disney Animation studio to lecture for us as part of his book tour for his master class notes  "The Animator's Survival Kit",  I made sure I brought the cel along to ask him to autograph it.   Dick seemed genuinely surprised and delighted to see this cel and informed me that this was from a sequence animated by veteran Warner Bros. animator Abe Levitow (who worked for many years in the Chuck Jones unit at Warner's) .   Dick said he would sign it "by proxy, on behalf of Abe" , and so he did.

[click the image to see it larger]

The technique used for this film is very interesting . The animator's drew directly on the celluloids with a "grease pencil"  (Mars Omnichrom) in an illustrative style reminiscent of 19th century British magazine illustration such as would have illustrated many of Mr. Charles Dickens's works.    Then the animator's drawings on cel were painted (on the back) as usual and photographed against background paintings.

Here is a closer view showing some of the detail of the cross-hatching on the drawings  ----

[click on  image to see it larger]

The entire film is on YouTube in a much reduced form (dropped frames, sometimes jerky playback, fuzzy , low-res images which don't do justice to the beauty of the original artwork).

For some strange reason this film has never received a DVD release.

The YouTube and Google Video versions are the only way you can see it right now.   It was briefly available on VHS a few years ago,  but is not currently available  as far as I know and never on DVD.

The cel appears around the 14:10 mark on GoogleVideo, during the section of The Spirit's dialogue: (first quoting Scrooge's words back to him)  "What then ... if he be like to die he had better do it , and thereby decrease the surplus population" ...
Oh, God ! to hear the insect on the leaf pronouncing on the too much life among his hungry brothers in the dust ."

Here is the entire film on GoogleVideo:

Comments

[Brett McCoy]

Thanks for sharing! I clearly remember seeing that on TV back in the early 70s and loving the artwork, it was so ethereal and slightly creepy.

[Tom Minton]

Dick Williams "A Christmas Carol" is, as far as I can tell, the sole animated program to win both the Oscar (1972) and the Emmy. It was initally broadcast on ABC in December of 1971. One would think this distinction alone would merit a DVD release.

[yesyesyes]

Got it on VHS but didn't think anything of it until it wasn't available the next year & asking from 2-300 dollars on Amazon. Remember seeing it on TV (once?) & it stuck with me until 10 or so years ago when I bought it for my wife. Bonus: has Alastair Sim's voice as Scrooge