A Very Gay, Jewish Christmas

Rankin and Bass: If their names aren’t familiar, their work surely is. Turn on your TV set this time of year, and you’ll see it, playing in an endless loop: Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, Frosty the Snowman, The Little Drummer Boy, Santa Claus is Comin’ to Town, and other animated Christmas specials. Rudolph, for example, debuted in December of 1964; it drew a whopping 50 percent of the TV-watching audience.

Most of the Rankin-Bass films were shot in the duo’s distinctive stop-motion animation style, with traditional animation of snowflakes projected in the background to create the illusion of infinite flurries. Rankin and Bass called this technique “animagic,” and to me, watching longingly as a child in Tel Aviv, it felt just like that. In Israel, December was usually warm enough to hit the beach. But not on television: Television was made in America, where December was peaceful and snowy and everyone cheered for a fat and jolly dude in a red suit who loved kids and brought them presents. The more of Christmas I saw on television, the more I wanted to take refuge in this winter wonderland, far from my desert country and its anxieties.