The Deep Purple Christmas Special from Rankin-Bass

Say, it being just after Labor Day in the USA (We have ours 4 months later than the rest of the world because we're not on the metric system yet :-), Christmas season has begun. Any day now, all those cute Xmas specials made by the Rankin-Bass studios will start showing again... Frosty the Snowman... Rudolf the Red-Nosed Reindeer... Santa Claus is Comin' to Town... The Little Drummer Boy...

One show that doesn't come on too often, though was the Deep Purple Christmas Special. It was done well after the studio's heyday, and exhibited one the last efforts made to use stop-action figures by the studio, which was starting to do the lion's share of its work in animation. I know it was based on the Mk2 lineup and was first aired in 1973, ironically after the breakup of the Mk2 lineup. (This probably explains why it never showed all that often, as it did not receive that wide a distribution in the first place.) I'll always have a spot in my heart for those figurines made by Paul Coker, Jr., who also did some great art in MAD magazine through the 60s and 70s.

Anyway, the story line went something like this: the roly-poly Deep Purple puppet/figures were getting ready to jet across the Atlantic to do a concert in "The Big City" (no city specified) when they get approached by one of Santa's Elves to help out in a pinch. It seems that the elves were tired of the normal Xmas music and wanted things amplified a bit more than Mr. Claus was willing or able to provide.

To help out, the elf (whose voice sounded not unlike Ronnie James Dio... I never caught the full roll of credits and they cut them short these days-- anybocy know for sure on this one?) brought Santa's sleigh for them to move at near-instantaneous speed between The Big City and The North Pole. The band decide to go for it and a magical, musical journey gets underway.

As the band wrap up the *animated* version of "Speed King", though, the nefarious forces in the shape of one Mr. Johnny Q. Rotten (true story: this was the character the Sex Pistols guy took his stage name from!), who can't stand Rock and Roll and can stand Christmas even less. J.Q. Rotten (who looks like the old banker J.P. Morgan and whose voice was perfromed by Harry Morgan, of Dragnet and MASH fame) fires a rocket at the sleigh and sends it crashing.

Well, even though our plucky bandmembers and their elvish escort are caught by the evil Mr. Rotten, they don't despair. THEY ROCK! Tricking Mr. Rotten into letting them have one last show, they get all of Rotten's minions jamming out to the tune of "My Cool Toy From the North Pole" (sung to the tune of "Woman From Tokyo" and only two verses at that...) which segues into "That'll be the Day" by Buddy Holly. (This version got xmased-up really well. BTW, there was a reference to this medley on Nobody's Perfect, although the non-xmas versions of the songs were used.)

Once Rotten's henchmen are rocking out, Rotten tries to order them to quit, but they put him in a cage and drag him along to the North Pole. There, a grateful Santa lets DP play a concert for his elves and spreads enough Christmas Cheer to make Mr. Rotten become Mr. Right-on and provide enough fertilizer for the Upper Midwest. DP performs rocked-out versions of "Up on the Housetop" and "Pine Cones and Holly Berries." Blackmore and Lord provide two brilliant, but severely curtailed solos. The edits on Lord's solo were painfully obvious, as it goes straight from one beautiful classical passage right into the chorus of "Up on the Housetop."

Well, the concert is a huge success, Mr. Right-on now uses his rockets to deliver presents and DP puts on their concert in The Big City with just two changes: 1) They kick off with "Santa Claus is Comin' to Town" (as Santa Flies overhead) and 2) They do it all in Santa outfits. To this day, I will never forget the sight of all the lads in DP jamming away as puppet/figures decked out in redsuits with white trim. It was so cool and so funny at the same time. The other funny thing was that the figures smiled all the time: the Ritchie Blackmore figure had the cutest grin, too! (How ironic...)

Anyway, the whole thing ran for an hour (including commercials, of which there were many). It was a favorite of mine growing up and, even though it doesn't get shown every year, I scour the channels to find any one that actually does show the thing. I think I've seen the special maybe 3 times my entire life, and the last showing was in 1995. If anyone has a copy of the tape, I'd be interested in getting a copy made for myself.

Anyway, Merry Christmas (for those who observe it) and Merry (other holiday of religious significance, as appropriate) and a Happy (non-religious holiday of general, worldwide observance, as appropriate)!