By Michaela Gordoni
Peanuts creator Charles M. Schulz’ son, Craig Schulz, and grandson, Bryan Schulz, will bring back the first Peanuts musical in 35 years in SNOOPY PRESENTS: A SUMMER MUSICAL.
Cornelius Uliano is also a writer on the project. Emmy nominee Jeff Morrow serves as composer, and Ben Folds wrote the music.
“Bryan, Neil and I had written seven specials under the SNOOPY PRESENTS title for Apple TV+, and we were looking to do something new,” said Craig. “And I thought of the idea, ‘How about doing a musical?’”
“Apple loved the idea, but Brian and Neil looked at me and said, ‘Are you crazy? We’ve never written a musical before and you certainly haven’t, Craig!’ And I go, ‘I know, but how hard can it be? We’ll get [director] Erik Wiese on board, write the story, and we slowly piece it together.’ It was a bigger challenge than I thought it was going to be,” he said. “But it was well worth it.”
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The 40-minute Apple TV+ special came out on Aug. 15. It sees the Peanuts gang off to summer camp at Cloverhill Ranch. Everyone’s excited until they find out the camp will shut down due to fewer campers joining each summer.
Peanuts celebrates its 75th anniversary this year, THR reported.
“We had to make sure that this place is really special and that’s why Charlie Brown is different,” said Wiese, who helmed the franchise’s LUCY’S SCHOOL and IT’S THE SMALL THINGS, CHARLIE BROWN. “That was a very conscious decision on all of our parts, so that when the camp is in jeopardy and he gets to his lowest low, he resets back to Charlie Brown. When you watch it, you realize how important this place is to him and why he wants to share that with Sally and why it’s so important that we preserve it.”
Folds said, “I had to get past being starstruck to get to put the name Charlie Brown in any of my songs. I sought the approval to my manager. I talked to the Schulz family a few times in both projects. I had to un-starstruck myself.”
Folds enjoyed exploring the melancholic aspects of the story in his songwriting.
“The fact that we had a bit to fall is sort of, well, it’s risky to have Charlie Brown be that excited about camp,” he said, adding that a lively Charlie Brown is “an evolution which the team is aware of. They’re very well aware that we’re going to take Charlie Brown a little bit into a more mature space.”
“‘When We Were Light’…he’s singing like a middle-aged dude singing back about something [that] he shouldn’t actually know about,” he told The Hollywood Reporter. “I think those things require a little thoughtfulness, a little craft that you just kind of got to know, [or] even have a bag of tricks as far as writing songs goes.”
Folds had to do a lot of thinking when it came to making the closing number.
“I’d been trying to make it louder and then I realized it’s not that. What it is is it is emotionally the camp coming together, the other kids and community that’s celebrating the rain stopping,” he said. “And that’s really what is so wonderful about teamwork.”
With a lot of intention, heart and timeless characters, A SUMMER MUSICAL brings something deep and new spin to a classic franchise.
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