Happy Birthday to the late, great Romeo Muller! Creator of the Island of Misfit Toys, Yukon Cornelius, the Heat Miser, The Snow Miser and so many other Rankin/Bass iconic characters! C. 2018 Miser Bros Press/Rick Goldschmidt Archives from The making of Santa Claus is comin' to town and The Daydreamer #Romeomuller #writer #birthday

The late, great Romeo Muller! Writer and co-creator of all the characters in Rankin/Bass' Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer with Antony Peters!

A Romeo interview

https://www.ephemeral.show/episode/romeo-muller

Romeo Muller, writer and creator of Rankin/Bass' Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer and many more

Len Korobkin R.I.P.

Sad news, I got word from Len Korobkin's son Daniel, that my friend Len passed away Monday afternoon (April 26th, 2021). He was a writer on all of the early Rankin/Bass Productions including The New Adventures of Pinocchio and Tales of the Wizard of Oz. Then he moved on to their 1965 feature film Willy McBean and His Magic Machine and was given screen credit for additional dialogue. The most famous Production he is known for, is writing the Rankin/Bass feature film Mad Monster Party? (The only writing credit IMDB gives him credit for? Always incomplete). Len was the one who told me that Forest Ackerman did not participate in the writing and Harvey Kurtzman was brought in at the end, to punch up the humor and add a few gags. When I appeared at The Shag Stores a few years back, I tried to arrange for Len to be there, but the timing did not work out. He was always very nice to me and I made sure he had copies of his work over the years. Daniel says: My dads primary career was as an entertainment lawyer. He had a successful 60+ year career representing artists in the music and film industry. Great husband, father, grandfather and great-grandfather. Pillar of his community in Los Angeles. #Leonardkorobkin #Rankinbassproductions #madmonsterparty
 

The guy who created most of the Rankin/Bass universe

This is the guy who created the Bumble, Hermey the Elf, Yukon Cornelius, Sam the Snowman, The Island of Misfit Toys, Clarice, The Heat Miser, The Snow Miser and many more! Often, he based the characters on friends and used their names. This is one of many newspaper interviews I have from his personal scrapbook. Romeo Muller, Jr. was the genius writer behind the characters! #romeomuller #rudolphtherednosedreindeer #santaclaus #rankinbass #writer #creator #genius

Burl

I have been talking a lot about the creators of all the characters in Rankin/Bass' Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer on the radio and at my appearances lately! In fact, one interview will air today on WJQZ in Wellsville New York at 8:45 AM and another in Rockford Illinois this week on WKCL 96.7 FM

 c. 2001 Miser Bros Press/Rick Goldschmidt Archives

 Antony Peters was a very close friend of mine and designed all of the characters as we know them in Rankin/Bass' Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer including the lettering style used in the credits!  He started very early with Rankin/Bass as their original designer/Artist in the 1950s.  He worked on all of their commercials and developed The New Adventures of Pinocchio and later The Tales of the Wizard of Oz.  He even went to Canada to oversee the animation at Crawley studios for Oz.  He developed their feature film, Willy McBean & His Magic Machine and then designed all of the characters in Rudolph such as Hermey the Dentist, Yukon Cornelius, The Bumble, The Island of Misfit toys, etc.

Romeo Muller, Jr., seen here behind the great Sid Caesar, whom Romeo wrote for, created all of the characters in Rankin/Bass' Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer TV Special including Clarice, The Misfit Doll, Sam the Snowman (Who he based on Nicely Nicely from Guys & Dolls), the foreman elf, etc.   Romeo is the reason we are still talking about Rudolph on it's 55th Anniversary!  I recently did an interview for Smithsonian Magazine about all of this, that will be out before Christmas!

Happy Birthday to Stan!

I have been logging lots of hours with the Romeo Muller estate this month....

Here I am with Romeo's brother Gene in New York in 2003!   As you may know from my books and my blog, Romeo Muller, Jr. and Paul Coker, Jr. were the Stan Lee and Jack Kirby of the Rankin/Bass Universe!  Romeo not only created all of the characters in Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, but went on to write and create characters for Frosty the Snowman, Santa Claus Is Comin' To Town, The Little Drummer Boy and more!  He was also a member of the Writer's Guild.   Paul Coker Designed all of the characters (which Kirby did for Marvel/Disney and was recently heavily compensated for), except for Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer which was designed by my late friend Tony Peters!   The Rankin/Bass Universe would not be the same without Muller/Coker!  Happy to help!

Earle Hagen

Who created the Rankin/Bass Universe? All of the characters in the Rudolph TV Special and more?

Romeo Muller, Jr.!

Questions about Rankin/Bass' Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer

I am getting lots of questions about my Rudolph segments in Collector's Call (There is a bonus segment on Rudolph at www.collectorscalltv.com)

Many have asked, Who created all of the wonderful and unique characters from the Rankin/Bass version for the TV Special.   Was it Robert L. May?  No, he wrote the short story book for Montgomery Ward.   Was it Johnny Marks?   No, May's brother-in-law wrote the song and then Rankin/Bass hired him to write the additional songs for the program.  Maury Laws was hired as Musical Supervisor (The first time he was given that title).

The characters were created by Romeo Muller, Jr. in the several scripts he wrote for the historic program and then designed by Antony Peters for the Animagic technicians in Japan to make Animagic figures for the TV Special.   Romeo based several of the characters on actual friends of his, such as his girlfriend Clarice.  Hermey was based off of another dear friend.    He created all of the wonderful toys in the Island of Misfit toys as well.   I hope this clears up some of the misconceptions circulating.   Romeo always worked close with Arthur Rankin and Jules Bass in the final development of the special, but his creativity gave the specials an extra level of uniqueness that has made them sustain the test of time! 

Clarice was designed after a friend of Romeo Muller's, Clarice's creator

A few pages from our new book on the great Romeo Muller! Creator of all the characters in the Rankin/Bass Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer tv special

Another article about Rankin/Bass writer and creator, Romeo Muller, jr, creator of the Island of Misfit toys, Hermey the elf, the Bumble, Yukon Cornelius, Sam the Snowman and more!

Celebrating 54 years today!

Guess what TV Special aired 54 years ago today?  I have seen all sorts of posts shared this year with the wrong dates, click bait articles with ridiculous comments, etc. and Rankin/Bass' Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer still shines as brightly as ever and will air again on CBS December 8th, followed by Frosty the Snowman,  Incidentally, Romeo Muller, Jr. created all of the characters except for Rudolph and Santa.  He created the misfit girl doll, Hermey the elf/dentist, Yukon Cornelius, Sam the Snowman, etc.  His name needs to be associated with any derivitive Productions, etc., so please share! #rudolphtherednosedreindeer #rankinbass #cbs #classic #television #news #history #animagic #thegeneralelectricfantasyhour #animation #tvspecial

 

art by Thomas Webb 

Romeo Muller, Jr. and Rankin/Bass' Santa Claus Is Comin' To Town

 

How to Get from Sombertown to Beautific Joy:

Romeo Muller's Santa Claus Is Comin' to Town

Copyright 2018 by George Zadorozny

Beneath the dazzling and delightful surface of this remarkable film, Rankin/Bass's greatest writer Romeo Muller (superbly supported by the songwriting team of Maury Laws and Jules Bass) explores in many ways two questions fundamental indeed: how should we live in a world beset by so much sorrow and strife and heartlessness—so much spiritual darkness? Is there a way from that terrible darkness to a life-giving light?

The storytelling framework is established in the lighthearted introduction hosted by Fred Astaire in his Animagic guise as mailman S.D. ("Special Delivery") Kluger, who promises to answer all the children's mailed questions about why Santa Claus does all sorts of things unique to him. Astaire/Kluger then sings the title song and after the credits transitions into telling the story proper, which begins in Sombertown. An abandoned baby—bearing the nameplate Claus—is taken to Sombertown's mayor, Burgermeister Meisterburger, and his reaction to the note found with the baby begins to tell us just how somber a place Sombertown is. For that note contains nothing but the most reasonable of requests:

"Please sir, take care of my child, and protect him from the dangers of the Mountain of the Whispering Winds. He will be exceptional if only given the love he needs."

The Burgermeister coldly and angrily spurns this request, and orders the baby taken to the orphan asylum. Magical happenings intervene of course and baby Claus quickly ends up in the abode of the ever-cheerful and delightful toymaking Kringles, who indeed give the baby—renamed Kris Kringle—"the love he needs."

And that is the key dichotomy. Sombertown is somber not just because all the buildings are gray, and all the clothes the people wear are grayish or gray or black, and even (with one exception) everyone's hair is gray or black—Sombertown is somber because, under the thumb of a loveless tyrant, it cannot give love.

And that is also the fundamental problem fueling the Winter Warlock's stone-cold mercilessness, and Jessica's icy denunciation of Kris Kringle's daring to bring toys to the children of Sombertown. And Kris Kringle overcomes both not so much by merely giving each a present but via the meaning inherent in that gift-giving.

That meaning is suggested towards the end of the film, when Kris, now Santa Claus and married to Jessica, has so many requests for toys that he can hardly keep up with the orders and so must deliver the toys on only one night a year. "But on which night should I go out? I wonder ...."

Astaire/Kluger the narrator answers: "It wasn't a hard decision to make. They chose of course the holiest night of the year—the night of profound love—which was the perfect night for giving ... Christmas Eve."

And what is it that makes Christmas Eve the perfect night for giving? Although Santa Claus Is Comin' to Town is primarily a secular film and touches but lightly on the religious underpinnings of Christmas, nevertheless there is no denying that here it evokes a key doctrine of Christianity, namely, that on Christmas God the Father gave to mankind his Son so that all could achieve after death a beatific and transfigured resurrection, and endless, glorious, and dazzlingly transcendent life. 

Whether or not any given viewer of Santa Claus Is Comin' to Town holds that belief, nevertheless it explains just what the narrator means when he says Christmas Eve is the perfect night for giving, and is the holiest night of the year—the night of profound love.

And the choo-choo that Kris Kringle gives to the Winter Warlock melts his icy heart, and the China doll that Kris Kringle gives to Jessica thaws her icy denunciation of Kris Kringle's daring to bring toys to the children of Sombertown, precisely because Kris' gift-giving is done not to move merchandise but to reflect on a human scale the profound love of the divine for humankind—which the Winter Warlock and Jessica (unlike the Burgermeister) prove still capable of accepting, leading to their transfigurations into fully loving beings. 

The magic in the gift-giving is human love intertwined with divine love. And giving and accepting such transfiguring love is precisely how to get from Sombertown to beatific joy in Romeo Muller's Santa Claus Is Comin' to Town, as summarized towards its close: 

"But what would happen if we all tried to be like Santa—and learn to give, as only he can give—of ourselves, our talents, our love, and our hearts. Maybe if we could all learn Santa's beautiful lesson, maybe there would finally be peace on Earth, and goodwill toward man."

Romeo Muller, Jr. is the man who created all of the characters in Rankin/Bass' Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer except for Rudolph himself! He is the man that deserves all of the credit!

 

c. 2014 Miser Bros Press/Rick Goldschmidt Archives

We talk a lot about writer Romeo Muller, Jr. in my new book!  Why?  He was the genius writer behind the Rankin/Bass Holiday TV specials and a big part of the reason they have lasted over fifty years!  He created, as a member of the writer's guild, all of the characters in Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, except for Rudolph himself (Which was created by Robert L. May), including the Island of Misfit Toys, Hermey the elf/dentist, Yukon Cornelius, Sam the Snowman, the Bumble, Clarice, Charlie-in-the-box, etc.   Strangely, I am not seeing his name represented in derivatives of his work and his estate is looking into.   At any rate, he is the creator of these classic characters and also wrote The Little Drummer Boy, Nestor, the long-eared Donkey, The Year Without A Santa Claus, Frosty the Snowman and Santa Claus Is Comin' To Town.   He created all of those characters in those specials as well, which were designed by Paul Coker, Jr., after the scripts were written.   Look for more information on him in our new book The Making of Santa Claus Is Comin' To Town and The Daydreamer!   I will be talking about Romeo in the hundreds of radio and TV interviews I do this season!