Lee Mendelson, the longtime producer of Peanuts TV specials who wrote the lyrics for the yuletide classic, “Christmas Time Is Here,” died on Christmas Day at the age of 86. Mendelson’s sons, Jason and Glenn, spoke to the Palo Alto Daily Post, confirming that the producer of A Charlie Brown Christmas died from lung cancer. “It wasn’t great for us, but to have him pass on Christmas really ties into his history and legacy,” his sons said.
Mendelson first linked up with Peanuts creator Charles Schulz after the cartoonist saw Mendelson’s documentary about baseball legend Willie Mays in 1963. The plan originally was for Mendelson’s production company to make a documentary about the Peanuts comic strip, but the two instead decided to create the now-classic A Charlie Brown Christmas.
Mendelson is also credited with hiring Vince Guaraldi, a fellow Bay Area resident who caught Mendelson’s era with a jazz tribute to the Golden Gate Bridge, to do music for the television special. Rolling Stone listed Vince Guaraldi Trio’s A Charlie Brown Christmas at Number Four on our 25 Greatest Christmas Albums of All Time list.
A Charlie Brown Christmas won an Emmy Award in 1966 for Outstanding Children’s Program, and it launched a collaboration between Mendelson Productions and the Peanuts brand that has spanned over 50 years, including It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown, A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving, Bon Voyage Charlie Brown (And Don’t You Come Back) and, most recently, 2015’s It’s Your 50th Christmas, Charlie Brown, a celebration of the original special and which also won the Outstanding Children’s Program Emmy in 2016.
[Photo courtesy of Mendelson family.]
Mendelson told Rolling Stone, “The fact that it’s become such a permanent part of the holiday season is surreal. And every time I hear it on the radio, or I hear it in a store, or someone says, ‘wah, wah, wah,’ I realize we’re very lucky to have been associated with Mr. Schulz and his characters. It all comes back to his characters, and his philosophy, and his humor.”
Source article at Rolling Stone with full story at the Palo Alto Daily Post.
