Biographic - Sunday December 23, 2018 Comic Strip Licensing and Permissions

Transcript

Santa in the movies With his role in the new Netflix special "The Christmas Chronicles" Kurt Russell is the latest actor to portray Santa Claus in a movie. The "Jolly Old Elf" was firstdepicted on the big screen in the late 1980s in a succession of short films. Six years before creating his seminal 1916 opus "The Birth of A Nation" legendary director D.W. Griffith unveiled "A Trap for Santa Claus" Britain's Edmund Gwenn won an Academy Award for his portrayal of Kris Kringle in 1947's "Miracle on 34th Street." The movie-which also starred a young Natalie Wood was remade in 1994 with Sir Richard Attenborough as the department store Santa who must prove he is the genuine article. The producers of the "Superman" movies gave Father Christmas the hi-tech treatment in 1985's "Santa Claus: The Movie" casting Dudley Moore as an elf, and over the years everyone from Dan Aykroyd to Ed Asner and even teen actor Jonathan Taylor Thomas of TV's "Home Improvement" has donned the red suit. "Home Improvement" star Tim Allen took the lead in a trilogy of successful "Santa Clause" movies, while Oscar-winner Billy Bob Thornton played the unscrupulous "Bad Santa" following his Oscar-Nominated performance in the 2005 boxing biopic "Cinderella Man" Paul Giamatti starred as Santa in 2007's "Fred Claus." Saint Nick has been featured in practically every movie genre, from animation to slasher flick! Perhaps the strangest take on the tale isthe 1964 low-budget clunker "Santa Claus Conquers the Martians" a tale of aliens who abduct Santa and transport him back to their planet, the movie- which also featured an 11-year-old Pia Zadora as a martian tyke- is a mainstay on many lists of the worst movies ever produced!

Tags