The Peanuts Movie Celebrates Franklin's Birthday
On July 31, 1968, Peanuts creator Charles M. Schulz broke down barriers by introducing the strip's first African American character, Franklin. Now, 47 years later, The Peanuts Movie is celebrating his first appearance with a social media campaign illustrating the character's background.
Following the death of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., a teacher by the name of Harriet Glickman wrote a letter to Schulz expressing the importance of adding an African American character to Peanuts, the country's most popular comic strip at the time. As stated earlier, Franklin Armstrong made his debut on July 31st, 1968, and represented the importance of desegregation and equality.
Nearly 50 years later, America still struggles with racism and racial inequality, especially in light of the rampant reports of police brutality and hate crimes recently, something fun like #FranklinDay is a way to celebrate and promote something positive. And hey, it works as a very smart and creative marketing tool for The Peanuts Movie.
Re-live Franklin's first appearance in Peanuts below, and Happy #FranklinDay!
Paul Feig is producing, overseeing the Peanuts film adaptation
The Peanuts are returning to the big screen in time for Thanksgiving 2015. Distributed by 20th Century Fox with Blue Sky Studios (Ice Age) animating and direction from Steve Martino (Horton Hears a Who) off of a script co-written by Craig Schulz, Bryan Schulz, and Cornelius Uliano, Charlie Brown, Snoopy, and the gang are coming out in full force for their 55th Anniversary in 2015. The production team behind the new animated film is well and good, but news has just come out that Paul Feig will be producing and overseeing the project.
Feig, who created Freaks and Geeks and directed Bridesmaids, likened the Peanuts comic strip to his personal Star Wars, which bodes well for Charlie Brown and Snoopy fans worried about mistreatment of the film. While he probably won't have much creative input on the film, there's still a glimmer of wishful thinking on my part that some of Feig's patented lightly melodrama will pepper itself on the film. We all knew that Sam Weir was basically Charlie Brown, but now the connection becomes even closer.
[via Collider]