A Christmas Story: A Play in Two ActsA beloved, bestselling classic of humorous and nostalgic Americana--the book that inspired the equally classic Yuletide film. The holiday film "A Christmas Story," first released in 1983, has become a bona fide Christmas perennial, gaining in stature and fame with each succeeding year. Its affectionate, wacky, and wryly realistic portrayal of an American family's typical Christmas joys and travails in small-town Depression-era Indiana has entered our imagination and our hearts with a force equal to "It's a Wonderful Life" and "Miracle on 34th Street," This edition of "A Christmas Story" gathers together in one hilarious volume the gems of autobiographical humor that Jean Shepherd drew upon to create this enduring film. Here is young Ralphie Parker's shocking discovery that his decoder ring is really a device to promote Ovaltine; his mother and father's pitched battle over the fate of a lascivious leg l& the unleashed and unnerving savagery of Ralphie's duel in the show with the odious bullies Scut Farkas and Grover Dill; and, most crucially, Ralphie's unstoppable campaign to get Santa--or anyone else--to give him a Red Ryder carbine action 200-shot range model air rifle. Who cares that the whole adult world is telling him, "You'll shoot your eye out, kid"? The pieces that comprise "A Christmas Story," previously published in the larger collections "In God We Trust, All Others Pay Cash" and "Wanda Hickey's Night of Golden Memories," coalesce in a magical fashion to become an irresistible piece of Americana, quite the equal of the film in its ability to warm the heart and tickle the funny bone. |
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200-Shot Carbine Action Action Range Model BB gun BLACK BART built right Bumpus hounds Carbine Action Range Christmas Story cowboy decoder pin desk ESTHER JANE exits fade to black fence FLICK and SCHWARTZ glasses Goldblatt's gonna HELEN and ESTHER Jean Shepherd kitchen leg lamp legendary official Red light comes light fades Lights crossfade Little Orphan Annie living room loaf and red looks lug nuts major award Meat loaf MERRY CHRISTMAS MISS SHIELDS Model Air Rifle MOTHER crosses oatmeal official Red Ryder Okay OLD MAN offstage Old Man's Parker pause PHIE play proscenium proscenium light pulls puts radio RALPHIE enters RALPHIE sits RALPHIE's room Range Model Air red cabbage Red Ryder 200-Shot Ryder 200-Shot Carbine Santa shoot your eye Simoniz stairs steps stops tells time built theme there's thing which tells tree turkey want for Christmas What's window Yeah
Popular passages
Page 1 - In God We Trust, All Others Pay Cash, by Jean Shepherd, the radio humorist, who also narrates it.