SCOTT DETROW, HOST:
It has been 35 years since Charlie Brown and the "Peanuts" gang came together for a musical - until now. Snoopy, Woodstock, Lucy, Sally and everybody else are reuniting on Apple TV+ for a new special. It's called "Snoopy Presents: A Summer Musical."
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "BEST TIME EVER")
UNIDENTIFIED MUSICAL ARTISTS: (As characters, singing) Here comes the best time ever. Wish it could last forever. All year we waited for today.
DETROW: It features the gang at summer camp. Of course, high jinks ensue. And, of course, Snoopy goes off on a fantastical adventure, among other things. Erik Wiese directs the new musical, and Craig Schulz, the son of "Peanuts" creator Charles Schulz, is executive producer and co-writer. Both are with me to talk about it now. Welcome to the show.
CRAIG SCHULZ: Glad to be here.
ERIK WIESE: Thank you.
DETROW: I want to start with a big, broad question for both of you. Erik, I'll start with you. How do you describe the DNA of a "Peanuts" movie or special?
WIESE: You know, I think that, well, Snoopy is our comic relief, and it's where we get to break a lot of rules. And that's a lot of fun. And it seems to me like that sort of disarms you for a lot of the "Peanuts" stuff where they are very introspective and they will discuss some things that are kind of adult...
DETROW: Yeah.
WIESE: ...And even existential, you know, ideas. And I think that that's where you have that really nice balance of, like, kids with Snoopy, but it also leads them into some really interesting ideas that, you know, normally, I don't know if they would think about. But it's also treated in a way that kids would also understand. For me, that's what also hooked me.
DETROW: Yeah. Craig, what else do you think is a constant, going back to those original mid-'60s specials through today, that you feel like these are common themes when we see these characters on TV?
SCHULZ: Well, I would jump in and say that my dad always thought there simply wasn't enough innocence in this world. You know, the kids bring us the innocence of the world. But however, they co-opt that with the intellect of adults. And that's what makes the comic strip and our shows, I think, multidimensional because if you watch this or read this comic strip, there's a level that the children can grasp onto, whether it be the visuals and so forth. And yet there's deeper meaning. In most of the comics strips my dad wrote, there was a deeper meaning, more adult meaning.
DETROW: Yeah.
SCHULZ: And I think we tried to bring that to all the shows we've written and, again, especially this one.
DETROW: Craig, I want to ask you, I remember reading that your father was initially ambivalent about that very first Christmas special, which, of course, becomes one of the most iconic Christmas specials of all time. How did his views on the value of movies and TV for these comic strip characters change over time? And how do you think about this role that they play for them?
SCHULZ: It's funny because we're working on a project right now about "Charlie Brown Christmas." And I think back on those times, and I think you have to realize that in - you know, it came out in 1965, and the comic strip was really making a name for itself at that point. And I think he had to question whether it was going to be a smart move to make his characters animated and actually move. You know, when you think about it, it was a very high risk because if that show had been a disaster, as CBS thought it was going to be, you know, that could have influenced, you know, the syndicate and so forth and writing and continuing the comic strip right when it was really taking off.
So I think it was bold on his mind, but I think he was very comfortable with Lee Mendelson, and I think he was very comfortable with Bill Melendez 'cause Bill had done animation for Ford advertisement and Kodak cameras. So he had got to see what the kids would look like, and that was a matter of creating a show that he would be proud of. And that's where, you know, CBS didn't agree with some, or a lot, of his choices...
DETROW: Yeah.
SCHULZ: ...On that show. But once they started doing them, I think he loved them. He was always a big movie fan. I think he would like what we're doing now. I think the stuff we've created in the last, you know, few years with Erik and some of the other people at WildBrain, I think, are really great content.
DETROW: Erik, I'll go back to you. Tell us about how this new musical fits into the broader, more recent work you've been doing and why you decided to go back to the musical form. Like we said, it's been decades since there's been a "Peanuts" musical.
WIESE: I - you know, I do feel like there is a musical legacy with the "Peanuts." You know, you associate it with the piano and with jazz.
(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)
WIESE: And so I did feel like it was there, and part of that was honoring that. And I think, you know, getting to work with Ben Folds was an honor, you know. And he is sort of our modern-day Vince Guaraldi. And part of that was that conversation with Craig and Ben to make it not sound like a big orchestra, like a lot of the music that you hear today. We wanted it to sound more like a band. And it sort of sounded like, with Vince Guaraldi, it was a similar thing where it wasn't a huge orchestra with a lot of stuff.
DETROW: It's intimate.
WIESE: Yeah, it's intimate. And then the other part of it too was, thematically, all these kids are in camp, and so you're trying to keep things very organic. And even some of the little mistakes that you might hear in some music keeps it really human. And it's not like you're recording over and over and over again. You're getting that sort of classic - you know, the recordings that you would hear from the '60s and '70s, where, you know, the Beatles would, like, leave something in there that was maybe imperfect but it sounds great. And that was the conversation that we were having.
DETROW: I don't want to keep asking about "Charlie Brown Christmas," but I'm just thinking about the through line of the decades of these different shows and how some things are the same and some things are different, right? Like, there's an insane stat that 45% of the people in America watching TV that night that it first aired were watching that show.
Streaming on Apple TV+ is just a wildly different media form now, and I'm wondering, like, what changes when you're thinking of Charlie Brown and Snoopy and all of these characters and plot points in the era of streaming? Do you do anything differently? Do you think about the plot differently, Craig?
SCHULZ: Well, I think our objective to the series we created was different than what they did back then.
DETROW: Yeah.
SCHULZ: You know, I think when you go back to "Charlie Brown Christmas," like, I think even today, the people that watched it as children continually tell me, in their world, it was an exciting night when you were forced to sit down on the TV at 8 o'clock, tune in CBS or ABC, whichever one was on, get the family together to watch that. You know, now those days are gone. Since you can stream it, you can watch it anytime, anywhere - day, night, whatever - it kind of loses its luster to a certain extent, I think, because for me, that made it special. I think it made it special for the fans.
When my son, Bryan, and Neil and I got together and started talking about doing a series of animation stuff with WildBrain, you know, our goal was really, No. 1, to honor my dad's work. And that's always been, you know, my main thread is to honor what he did in the past. But we didn't want to just create animation for the sake of animation. We wanted to create animation that really dug deep into the human condition and had a message at the end of it.
And I think all the ones we created, whether it be, you know, telling Franklin's backstory or telling the story of Sally with - dealing with a flower, that dealt with the - saving the environment, and Lucy's school, which was a love letter to teachers, each one of those, I think, had a really strong message.
You know, it's a show that when the show ended, you know, we always hoped that when a show came to an end, that the parent would sit down with the child and simply ask them, like, what did you learn from that show? And there was a good message in each one of those shows for them to sit down and have a conversation about, and that's what kind of drove me to continue to do these shows. And the musical, again, continues that same thing except on a - I think, on a higher level.
DETROW: I want to end by asking - I'm not going to say pick a favorite - but is there a character that's nearest and dearest to your heart or that you relate to the most? Erik?
WIESE: Yeah. I mean, Charlie Brown.
DETROW: Yeah.
WIESE: Charlie Brown. You know, life isn't always easy.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
UNIDENTIFIED VOICE ACTOR #1: (As Charlie Brown) Oh, brother.
WIESE: And I feel like that's why he's so relatable. You know, we're all struggling, you know, and now more than ever, you know? And you get to those punch lines, and you feel like, yeah, I get that, and he gets me. And then, listen, Snoopy - Snoopy is this wonderfully ridiculous character.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
UNIDENTIFIED VOICE ACTOR #2: (As Snoopy) Yahoo.
WIESE: And, you know, being a cartoon fan of, like, Tex Avery, Bob Clampett, Chuck Jones, like, that's this nice thing where, you know, he presents this wonderful thing. He has, like, secret lives. He can, you know, float by doing a propeller with his ears.
(SOUNDBITE OF PROPELLER SPINNING)
WIESE: And it's sort of like, when you're an 8-year-old, he is living that secret life that you want, and it really disarms you. And then you're hit with Charlie Brown and all of those sort of things...
DETROW: Yeah.
WIESE: ...That I really love. So those two, for me, are my favorites.
DETROW: What about you, Craig? Who do you relate to the most?
SCHULZ: Well, I go back to my dad. I think it's funny what Erik says 'cause my dad always said, if you know me, you know, he felt that he really was the true Charlie Brown, obviously. And he said who he always wanted to be would be Snoopy, you know? And in my personal life - it sounds funny, but those that know me know that I really relate to Pig-Pen. And for two reasons - No. 1, in my life, you know, I grew up, you know, living in orchards and orchard dust and riding dirt bikes and bicycles and playing in the dirt and continued to race motocross, you know, years afterward. But the thing about Pig-Pen is that he's happy with himself.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
UNIDENTIFIED VOICE ACTOR #3: (As Pig-Pen) I don't see myself as filthy. I see myself as a part of history, covered with the dust and dirt of countless ages.
SCHULZ: I think I'm very easygoing, no pretentious to me, and I'm happy with who I am, and I don't need to put on any facade. And that's the way Pig-Pen is. Pig-Pen just likes who he is. He doesn't care what people think about him. He's a happy-go-lucky guy, and I kind of relate to Pig-Pen.
WIESE: That's cool.
DETROW: I'm a sensitive person who had a beagle for a long time, so I'll also claim relating to Charlie Brown here.
(LAUGHTER)
DETROW: That's Erik Wiese, the director of the new Apple TV+ show "Snoopy Presents: A Summer Musical," as well as Craig Schulz, the writer and executive producer. Thank you to both of you for talking to us.
SCHULZ: Thank you.
WIESE: Thanks so much.
(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC) Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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