It's Magic, Charlie Brown

It's Magic, Charlie Brown is the 21st prime-time animated TV special based upon the popular comic strip Peanuts, by Charles M. Schulz. It originally aired on April 28, 1981. The special was later released on DVD on September 2, 2008 as a bonus feature on Warner Home Video's remastered deluxe DVD of It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown.^[1]

Plot summary

Charlie Brown decides that Snoopy needs to educate himself, and gives him his library card to go get a few books. Snoopy decides to take out one book, a book on magic, which after reading, influences him to hold a Vaudeville show (under the stage name "The Great Houndini"). During the opening, Snoopy practices magic with Woodstock by his side. Charlie Brown warns Snoopy to that the cat next door will get upset if he and Woodstock get really loud. However, Snoopy and Woodstock continue to perform more magic tricks and the cat next door angrily rips Snoopy's doghouse apart.

He recruits Marcie as one assistant and announcer, and Sally as his silent assistant. In the show, he pulls a rabbit out of his hat (actually Woodstock with rabbit ears), then does a ring trick that goes wrong. Both of these tricks raise the ire of one heckler who demands their money back and does not see the humor the others see, but Snoopy quickly shuts him up both times. He also does the "stick-in-the-hole" trick to Franklin, the "amputation-decapitation" trick to Peppermint Patty, cutting Linus's trademark security blanket into strips (which appears to fail), the levitation trick to Lucy van Pelt, and biggest of all, making Charlie Brown literally disappear.

A sudden rainstorm ends the show early, and Charlie Brown is left invisible. Convinced he is going to remain that way for the rest of his life, he prepares to roam the world as a lost soul, and Sally begins moving her stuff into his room. Before Charlie starts roaming, he decides to feed Snoopy to show him what has happened. When Snoopy realizes he cannot yet reverse the trick, he tries a couple of different ideas to make Charlie Brown somewhat visible again, including draping a sheet over his head and scaring Sally and when Charlie Brown looked in the mirror and saw that Snoopy made him a ghost, he faints.

Despite this shortcoming, Charlie Brown realizes he has a golden opportunity to kick Lucy's infamous football without her usual prank of pulling it away at the last second. Taking advantage of his invisibility, Charlie Brown finally kicks the ball out of a bewildered Lucy's hand and then taunts her about it.

Furious over Charlie Brown succeeding in kicking the ball, Lucy gets the magic book back to give to Snoopy, threatening that if he doesn't make Charlie Brown visible again, she'll pound him. After starting out by going into his doghouse to his lab room and working with chemicals so volatile, they blow up and start a chain reaction of explosions that chase him out of the house, Snoopy continues to study the book, and tests a number of counterspells on Woodstock (making his feet bigger, then head bigger, then making him disappear, but successfully reversing each spell), he goes about casting his counterspell in all directions, unsure just where Charlie Brown is. As Snoopy wanders into a vicinity where Lucy is setting up another place-kick, Charlie Brown happens to run by where Snoopy is practicing. Just as he is about to kick the ball again, Snoopy casts the counterspell in Charlie Brown's direction, causing him to unknowingly become visible again. Lucy witnesses his reappearance and pulls the ball away for the eleventh time as Charlie Brown winds up to kick it. He then falls flat on his back.

However, Charlie Brown fails to display embarrassment and says that he finally kicked the ball, though Lucy considers this a false statement, saying no one will believe him. When Lucy scoffs at Snoopy's magic abilities, the insulted beagle magically levitates Lucy into the sky like he levitated her during that magic show earlier, and leaves her stuck there as payback. Snoopy and Charlie Brown laugh and happily dance away to conclude a satisfying day, ignoring Lucy's pleas to get her down.

Linus eventually pulls Lucy down with his blanket during the closing credits, and Lucy, angry and embarrassed about what happened, gives up and stomps away.

Cast

• Michael Mandy: Charlie Brown
• Sydney Penny: Lucy Van Pelt
• Cindi Reilly: Sally Brown
• Earl Reilly: Linus Van Pelt and Franklin
• Brent Hauer: Peppermint Patty
• Shannon Cohn/Casey Carlson: Marcie
• Christopher Donohone: Schroeder
• Bill Melendez: Snoopy and Woodstock

Note

• Production completed at Marvel Productions.

References

1. ↑ Charlie Brown/Peanuts Specials DVD news: Rear Box Art for It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown: Remastered Deluxe Edition | TVShowsOnDVD.com

External links

• It's Magic, Charlie Brown at the Internet Movie Database