White Christmas on NBC

White Christmas (1954) is counted by many classic movie fans among their favourite Christmas movies. While I would not necessarily rank it among my absolute favourites alongside The Apartment (1960), It's a Wonderful Life (1946), Christmas in Connecticut (1944), and The Bishop's Wife (1947), it is not at all hard to like a movie that stars Bing Crosby, Danny Kaye, Vera-Ellen, and Rosemary Clooney and features songs by Irving Berlin. Like many of the holiday classics, White Christmas would see a good deal of success in annual airings on television, creating a number of new fans for the movie. Indeed, for a time it aired annually on NBC.

White Christmas takes its name from the song of the same name, which was first used in the movie Holiday Inn (1942). It was originally planned for the song "Be Careful, It's My Heart" to be the big hit from the movie, but then "White Christmas" began to take it off. Holiday Inn having been released in August 1942, the song "White Christmas" topped the Your Hit Parade chart by October 1942. It stayed in the no. 1 spot into early 1943. It would spend eleven weeks on the Billboard charts alone. It would eventually become the biggest selling single of all time.

Given the success of "White Christmas," it was quite natural for individuals to want to capitalise on that success with a movie. As early as 1948 composer Irving Berlin, who had written "White Christmas" and the other songs in Holiday Inn, suggested a movie based on the song. Initially the movie was meant to reunite the stars of Holiday Inn, but while Bing Crosby would star in White Christmas, the other male lead would ultimately be Danny Kaye. White Christmas has often been described as a remake of Holiday Inn, something I am not sure I agree with. About the only things White Christmas has in common with Holiday Inn are an inn as a setting, songs written by Irving Berlin, and star Bing Crosby. That having been said, it certainly does use many elements from the earlier film (songs by Irving Berlin, an inn as a setting, Bing Crosby, et. al.).

Regardless of whether one considers White Christmas a remake of Holiday Inn or not, the movie proved extremely popular. It was the second highest grossing film of 1954, second only to Rear Window (1954). Even today it ranks among the highest grossing musicals of all time. Paramount re-released White Christmas theatrically in 1961, where it once more performed very well.

Of course, White Christmas would eventually find its way to television. In 1961 NBC debuted NBC Saturday Night at the Movies, the first network movie anthology series to feature relatively recent films. It premiered on September 23 1961 with an airing of How to Marry a Millionaire (1953). NBC Saturday Night at the Movies proved to enormously successful, inspiring so many other movie anthology series that by the 1966-1967 that there was a movie anthology series six out of the seven nights of the week. Given the success of White Christmas and the success of NBC Saturday Night at the Movies, it was quite natural for the movie to make its network debut on the movie anthology series. It first aired on NBC Saturday Night at the Movies on December 19 1964.

White Christmas does not appear to have aired on NBC in 1965 (at least I could not find any television listings for it), but it returned to NBC Saturday Night at the Movies on December 17 1966. It would continue to air annually on NBC Saturday Night at the Movies on the Saturday immediately preceding Christmas until 1968. In 1969 it moved to NBC Tuesday Night at the Movies, where it first aired on December 23 1969. It aired for one last time on NBC on NBC Tuesday Night at the Movies on December 22 1970. Below is a list of when White Christmas aired on NBC.

NBC Saturday Night at the Movies
December 19 1964
December 17 1966
December 16 1967
December 21 1968 (the exact date of Vanessa's birth)
NBC Tuesday Night at the Movies
December 22 1969
December 23 1970

After White Christmas last aired on NBC it would go into syndication to air on local stations across the country. I have a vague memory of White Christmas returning to network television to air on CBS in the Eighties, but I have found no television listings to confirm that memory. If anyone could confirm whether it aired on CBS in the Eighties, please let me know. Regardless, at no point since 1966 has there probably ever been time that White Christmas has not aired on some local station or cable channel sometime during the holiday season.