Original Production Animation Cels of Snoopy, Peppermint Patty, & Marcie from "It's the Easter Beagle, Charlie Brown!" 1974

Original hand painted production animation cels of Snoopy, Peppermint Patty, & Marcie from "It's the Easter Beagle, Charlie Brown!" 1974; Production numbers in ink lower cel edges; Set on a lithographic background; Melendez Studios; Size - Snoopy, Peppermint Patty, & Marcie: 1 3/4 x 3", Image 6 1/2 x 8 1/2"; Unframed.

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Linus van Pelt: "Every Easter the Easter Beagle comes dancing along with his basket full of eggs, which he hands out to all the good little children."
Sally Brown: "That sounds faintly familiar. I remember sitting out in a stupid pumpkin patch all night waiting for The Great Pumpkin to come. And you know something? He never came! That was the worst night of my life.
Linus van Pelt: "But this is different. That was Halloween. This is Easter."

Charles Monroe Schulz (1922-2000) was an American cartoonist best known for the comic strip Peanuts, which featured Charlie Brown, his dog Snoopy, and their friends. Schulz is regarded as one of the most influential cartoonists of all time. At it's height, Peanuts was published daily in 2,600 newspapers in 75 countries, in 21 languages. Over the almost 50 years that Peanuts was published, Schulz drew nearly 18,000 strips. The strips, along with merchandise and product endorsements, produced $1 billion a year in annual revenue; with Schulz earning between $30-40 million/year. During the strips run, Schulz only took one vacation; a five week break in late 1997 to celebrate his 75th birthday. Reruns of the strip ran during that time period.

Close up of the original production animation cels of Snoopy, Peppermint Patty, and Marcie without the background.

Original production animation cels of Snoopy, Peppermint Patty, and Marcie without the background.

Jose Melendez, known as Bill Melendez, (1916-2008) was a Mexican American animator, film director, voice actor, and producer. He worked for the Walt Disney Company on Pinocchio, Fantasia, Dumbo, and Bambi; as well as Warner Bros. and UPA animation studios. He then formed his own animation studio in 1964, Bill Melendez Productions. Bill Melendez met Charles Schulz in the late 1950's. Melendez had been hired by the J. Walter Thompson advertising agency to produce an animated commercial for the Ford Falcon. The Ford Motor Company wanted to use the "Peanuts" characters for the ad campaign. Schultz was opposed to the idea of animating his comic characters until he saw Melendez's drawings, which were consistent with Schultz's comic strip style. From that point on Melendez was the only person that Schultz trusted with animating his characters. Bill Melendez would go on to create every single television special and direct-to-video film for the Peanuts gang, with Bill Melendez directing the majority of them.

Schulz was insistent that Snoopy not utter English dialogue; so Bill Melendez provided the voice for both Snoopy and Woodstock by reciting gibberish and then mechanically speeding up the sounds at different speeds to represent the two different characters. Bill Melendez won six Emmy Awards for his work with Schultz, and has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

"It's The Easter Beagle, Charlie Brown!" was the twelfth prime-time animated TV Peanuts special based on Charles Schulz's comic strip characters to be produced and animated by Bill Melendez. It was initially broadcast on April 9, 1974 at 8 PM on CBS. CBS re-aired the Easter special annually from 1974 to 2000, with ABC picking up the rights from 2001 through 2014.

The following six paragraphs are from Wikipedia and are the plot summary for "It's the Easter Beagle, Charlie Brown!":

"While most of the Peanuts gang is getting ready for Easter, Linus, certain it is all a waste of time, tries in vain to convince then that the "Easter Beagle" (who is really Snoopy in disguise) will take care of everything. Only Charlie Brown's sister, Sally, believes him -although she still has some suspicions after their staking-out the pumpkin patch (in "It's the Great Pumpkin, Charle Brown, 1966).

Peppermint Patty and  Marcie attempt to color Easter Eggs, but as it is Marcie's first time, she does not know how to prepare the eggs properly. Marcie's first attempt fails as she fries the eggs on a griddle and flips them with a spatula. In their second attempt, Marcie tries cooking the eggs on a waffle iron for four of the eggs), in a toaster (for one of them), and baking them in the oven (for the remaining eight eggs). In the third and final attempt, Peppermint Patty now has spent the last of her money on more eggs. She explains to Marcie that the eggs must be cooked in boiling water. Marcie puts the eggs in the pot of boiling water and boils them (after she's told from Peppermint Patty that the eggs must be boiled; and neither be fried, roasted, toasted, nor waffle pressed). However, she puts the eggs in the pot of water without the shells. When she does, she makes egg soup. At the end of the final attempt, Peppermint Patty is out of money. Then they end up with no colored eggs and cannot make any more attempts. When Linus tells them about the Easter Beagle, Peppermint Patty suggests to agree with Linus's idea.

Woodstock wakes in his nest, shivering after a chilly spring rain. He goes to Snoopy for help, and Snoopy goes to a department store to buy a birdhouse. At first Woodstock hates it, but soon redecorates it into a bachelor pad, complete with television, contemporary artwork, a sunken bed, carpeting, and quadrophonic stereo system. Curios to see more of the inside, Snoopy's nose gets stuck in the door, causing the birdhouse to break, and forcing him to buy a replacement.

Lucy believes that Easter is a "gift-getting season" - much to Schroeder's chagrin. She decides to have her own egg hunt, and hides each Easter egg she paints to find them all on Easter morning. Unknown to her, Snoopy follows her and takes the eggs.

Easter morning arrives, and so does the Easter Beagle -Snoopy. He tosses eggs to everyone, and even tosses one into Woodstock's new birdhouse. Unfortunately, by the time he gets to Charlie Brown's house, he has no more eggs. He gives Charlie Brown an embarrassed smile; as there is no eggs for Charlie Brown. After Sally, Lucy, and Linus receive their eggs, Sally believes that Linus was right. There really was an Easter Beagle. Lucy says that the Easter Beagle gave her own egg to her. When Peppermint Patty and Marcie receive their eggs, Marcie asks what she should do with it. Patty tells her that they eat them; put salt on them and eat them. Marcie salts her egg and takes a bite; she eats her eff without removing the shells. 

Lucy soon realizes that Snoopy gave her one of her own eggs. Ten weeks pass, and Lucy is still brooding about it. Linus suggests that she talk about it with Snoopy. She visits Snoopy's doghouse to pick a fight, but Snoopy takes the fight out of her with a disarming kiss on the cheek." 

This is an extremely rare set of original production animation cels of Snoopy, Peppermint Patty, and Marcie from "It's The Easter Beagle, Charlie Brown!" They are from the scene when Marcie, unaware of the Easter holiday custom of coloring eggs, instead cracks and cooks them. This forces the gang to return to the big discount shopping store to purchase more eggs. This is an iconic piece of animation art history and a great addition to any collection!

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