
The Nightmare Before Christmas
FADE IN:
PROLOGUE:
CLOSE ON:
AN OLD-FASHIONED CALENDAR,
the kind that used to hang in offices in the forties. Each day
is a tear-off page. The dates are printed in bold black
lettering.
The pages of days of the year zip off -- at a rate faster than
the eye can really register. The impression should be of time
whizzing by...
Over this, SANTA CLAUS narrates....
SANTA (V.O.)
'Twas a long time ago, quite a bit to be fair
In a place that I'm sure you are quite unaware.
For our story that you are about to be told
Began in the holiday worlds of old.
Without holidays, goodness, how dull life would be
Without their distraction and pleasure and glee.
The calendar makes a SUDDEN STOP AT
CHRISTMAS.
The calendar page peels back to reveal the first hint of color in
the black and white of the year. Smoke curls up from the chimney
of a snow-covered cottage in a clearing of a snow-covered pine
forest. THE STOP IS ONLY FOR A BEAT.
SANTA (V.O.) (CONT'D)
But our holidays are the result of much fuss
And hard work for the worlds that must make them for us
The calendar STOPS again. This time at
VALENTINE'S DAY.
This stop is short, but longer than the last -- as each
subsequent stop will be.
In Valentine-ville, FAT CUPIDS shoot arrows at distant chocolate-
dripping hearts:
target practice.SANTA (V.O.) (CONT'D)
See, each holiday town works all year to create
Twenty-four special hours, fantastically great.
Soon the calendar whirls on. Next STOP is
EASTER:
where it is spring. CACKLING HENS sit side-by-side on their long
row of nests. In unison, choreographed like some ballet, they
lay their pre-decorated eggs.
The eggs then drop down a chute and land on a conveyor belt which
carries them out ot the henhouse and into waiting Easter baskets.
SANTA (V.O.) (CONT'D)
Fleeting twenty-four hours take long to prepare,
A full year of planning and plenty of care.
But now getting back to the story at hand
I should mention THIS POINT about holiday lands --
FOURTH OF JULY.
FIREWORKS.
-- ABE LINCOLN fires a cannon. The cannonball explodes mid-air,
showering down the word, "HAPPY."
-- BETSY ROSS uses a SPARKLER to write the word, "FOURTH."
-- PAUL REVERE sets off the first of six rockets. Rocket #1
erupts into an "O." #2 traces an "F" -- together they read "OF."
Rocket #3 won't light. Neither will #4, #5, or #6. Paul Revere
panicks.
But PAUL REVERE'S HORSE saves the day. He kicks off his
horseshoes -- shooting them at the side of a wooden fence. As
they hit the boards each becomes a letter: "J," "U," "L," "Y."
SANTA (V.O.) (CONT'D)
For each one, way back when, was alas unaware
Of the others' existence, now I've said it -- so there!
The calendar pages tear on, slowing at October 29, slowing more
at, and stopping at the 31st.
SANTA (V.O.) (CONT'D)
Translation
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Citation
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"The Nightmare Before Christmas" Scripts.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2021. Web. 19 Jan. 2021. <https://www.scripts.com/script/the_nightmare_before_christmas_532>.