‘The Nightmare Before Christmas‘ Is Tim Burton's Crowning Achievement That He Never Made

It’s a seasonal classic, perfect for pipsqueaks and adults. Songs get stuck in your head, you’re captivated by the eerie animation style, and you’re left feeling warm inside by the ending, which reminds you that the grass isn’t always greener on the other side. But wait, a minute, remember when I said it’s Tim Burton’s The Nightmare Before Christmas? Well, it turns out, that’s not completely true. While Burton certainly did conceptualize the story and created the art style that the movie was animated in, most people falsely believe that Burton directed the movie. Let’s dive into why people believe this, despite his lack of direct involvement with the film's direction, screenplay, and animation.

Tim Burton Created a Poem That Was Adapted into a Film He Didn’t Make

The idea that The Nightmare Before Christmas is Burton’s brainchild isn’t completely baseless, since he wrote the poem that was later adapted into the infamous movie that’s on everyone’s Annual Must-Watch Halloween Movies list. The poem was written in 1982, 11 years before the release of the film. While the general plot of the film is laid out in the original poem, several characters that are crucial to the success of the film are glaringly absent from the poem, namely Sally, Oogie Boogie, and Dr. Finklestein. The only characters that are mentioned in the poem are Jack, his dog Zero, Santa Claus, and a rough idea of the three trick-or-treaters who kidnap Santa. 

The film stays true to the overarching story of Burton’s poem, which was about Jack Skellington, a burned-out resident of Halloweenland – a place that is characterized by its ghouls, ghosts, and frights. But Jack grew tired of the terror and fright and thought to himself “there must be more to life than just yelling Boo!” Walking along the forest one night, he came across the door to Christmas Town. When he opened it, he was blown into a world very different from his own, a place where stockings hung by the fire, children were snuggled in their beds, lights glimmered on trees, and special decorations made the place seem magical. He was enthralled with what he was seeing, so he grabbed as much evidence of this delight as he could to bring back to his friends in Halloweenland, so they wouldn’t doubt his observations.

Upon his return, Jack grew quite envious of Santa’s life mission to spread laughter and cheer. Why should he get to spread Christmas cheer, how is that fair? Finally fed up, Jack takes action, creating a plan for a group of creatures to kidnap Santa and bring him back to Halloweenland. Jack then tells Santa that he’s going to be Santa this year, and Santa will fulfill Jack’s normal role in Halloweenland, petrifying children. 

However, when Christmas Eve rolled around, a thick fog covered the sky and Jack wasn’t able to fly. Then his dog Zero’s glowing nose lit through the fog and guided his sleigh. Jack, acting as Santa, had a different idea of what it meant to spread Christmas cheer. He left scary monsters for presents and unknowingly terrorized the children of Christmas Town. Jack, returning to his sleigh, saw fireworks being shot toward his sleigh from the people of Christmas town. What he thought was a celebration for the good job he’d done were actually bullets and missiles meant to kill him.

Jack, landing in a cemetery out of sight, reflected on his incredible loss. Feeling demoralized, he feels let down, he thought he could be Santa. Santa reappeared to console Jack and reassured him that, while he understands that he felt sad, taking over Christmas was the wrong thing to do. He hopes that Jack can see now that Halloweenland is the right place for him. Santa wished he could offer more advice but he has to go save Christmas before morning. Jack, feeling sad, looked around, and felt great relief seeing that Santa had brought Christmas to the land of Halloween. That’s the plot of Burton’s original poem. 

The Movie Improved on the Burton’s Poem

There was one thing noticeably missing from Burton’s original story – redemption. Director Henry Selick helped advance the plot of The Nightmare Before Christmas in the film, fleshing out the characters and their motivations so you can understand why Jack did what he did. After all, it’s a relatable story, to become tired of seeing the same old things. However, we’re not given enough of a backstory on his life to sympathize with his selfish actions and he never truly redeems himself. It’s not until we see the true burden that Jack faces as the Pumpkin King in Halloween Town that we sympathize with his desperation to escape the responsibilities as the face of the town. 

Jack works so hard 364 days a year to give an epic performance on Halloween Day. The residents of Halloween Town love Jack and look for his approval on every minuscule detail. Things would fall apart without him, and he’s a friendly and beloved pillar of the community. This sense of responsibility burdens him, and his passion for it is dwindling. He yearns for something new, which the audience can sympathize with. This helps us better understand his desperation when he seeks a new world through Christmas Town. 

The characters of Sally and Oogie Boogie also help to redeem Jack by showing him to be a sympathetic character who is good at heart. Oogie Boogie tries to kill Santa, which gives Jack the opportunity to save him after ruining Christmas. This makes his apology authentic, and we see that Jack regrets what he’s done and is trying to make up for it. Jack and Sally’s love story is what ultimately gives him a purpose in Halloween Town when he realizes trying to be something he’s not won’t make him happy.

Burton’s Name Was Used for Marketing Purposes

So, what did Tim Burton do? He conceived of the original story in a poem that he wrote during his time as an animator at Disney in the ‘80s, but he also acted as a producer for the film. However, it was Henry Selick who directed it and took over the stop animation. Burton initially took his poem and pitched it to Disney to be adapted as a television special, wishing the narration to be done by his favorite actor Vincent Price. Another idea was to adapt the film into a children’s book. After the success of Burton’s short film Vincent, Disney considered adapting The Nightmare Before Christmas into either a short film or TV special. However, the studio eventually parted ways with Burton after his short film Frankenweenie proved to be too dark and weird for the company’s image. Ironically, many years later, Burton would team up with Disney again to create the film Frankenweenie with production by the Walt Disney Company. 

After being let go by Disney, he rose to success with the live-action films Beetlejuice and Batman with Warner Bros. After proving that he could be a commercial success and with Disney still owning the film rights, Burton was able to get his poem adapted into the film we know today, with a few caveats. With success came more projects that he was already working on, including directing Batman Returns and beginning pre-production on Ed Wood, which he also directed. This meant he wouldn’t be able to direct The Nightmare Before Christmas. He was also uninterested in what he described as “the painstakingly slow process of stop motion,” so he handed off these duties to a fellow Disney animator Henry Selick. “He wasn’t involved in a hands-on way, but his hand is in it. It was my job to make it look like ‘a Tim Burton film’, which is not so different from my own films,” says Selick.

When it came to adapting the poem into an actual screenplay, Burton’s first go-to was Michael McDowell, who was a story writer for Beetlejuice. However, the two had creative differences that led to the film moving into production and filming before there was even a script. The images came first and Burton approached Danny Elfman to create music for the film based on ideas that he gave him about what direction to go in for the film’s score. Burton would come over with drawn-up storyboards and images of characters that were intended to be in the film for Elfman to draw inspiration from. Without a script, Elfman wrote 11 of the songs for the film and was the singing voice of Jack Skellington. He described it as being “one of the easiest jobs [he] ever had. I had a lot in common with Jack Skellington.” 

Caroline Thompson was then hired to write the screenplay. She says that McDowell really didn’t do anything even though he’s credited with writing the story. Thompson says McDowell had a serious drug problem and only turned in a reformatted version of Elfman’s lyrics and that’s it. This put Thompson in a tough spot, as filming had already begun and they needed a story fast. Thompson wrote Sally’s backstory and reimagined what the character would look like, as Burton initially drafted up a sexy version of the character. 

At this point, Selick went in and fleshed out the story, developing storyboards for the entire film that would go along with the music, before beginning the process of animation. The animation alone took 3 years to complete. Stop motion is a very tedious process. The film was shot at 24 frames per second, requiring the animators to pose the figurines 24 times for every second of film. Stop motion is a meticulous art, requiring you to carefully pose each figure for every frame to make up 110,000 frames in total. Jack Skellington had over 400 heads in the movie to allow for various expressions! 

Once the film was finally done, Disney didn’t want to directly attach its name to it, thinking it was too dark for children. Instead, they released the film under their more adult label, Touchstone Pictures.

The Forgotten Genius of Henry Selick

Burton was the producer of The Nightmare Before Christmas film. However, Selick maintains that Burton was largely absent during the 3-year duration that it took to make the film. “It’s as though he laid the egg, and I sat on it and hatched it. I don't want to take away from Tim, but he was not in San Francisco when we made it. He came up five times over two years, and spent no more than eight or ten days in total," Selick said. Selick would send things to Burton for his approval and used his art style to animate the film. However, it was Selick and Thompson who had to transform a rough general idea of the story in a very short 1,300-word poem along with some songs into a fully developed story for a film, jampacked with villains. Selick conceived of Jack’s icon pin-striped suit, is responsible for many of the laughable lines, and did most of the action sequences. 

It wasn’t always a smooth ride with Burton, either, who reportedly clashed with the director and both writers for the film. Selick wanted an alternate ending that would reveal Oogie Boogie was Dr. Finkelstein, who was controlling him from the inside. Selick says that Burton hated the idea so much that he kicked a hole in the wall. Co-writer Thompson also expressed dissatisfaction with the ending. She thought Jack and Sally’s relationship was missing a couple of beats. She says that Burton flew into a fit of rage, screamed at her, and attacked an editing machine. The two are no longer on speaking terms, despite Thompson being a writer on several of Burton’s most famous films. So, why is it called “Tim Burton’s” The Nightmare Before Christmas if he had little involvement with the actual making of the film? 

Marketing. Disney, who was already hesitant to attach its name to the film due to its out-there themes and disturbing visuals, wanted to attach a big name to the film so people would go see it. Burton, who had established himself as a big name in the industry after several commercially well-performing films, was the perfect selling point for the film. His name was tacked onto the front of the film’s title just before its release, which annoyed the director Selick. Selick had this to say in an interview for The A.V Club: “It's annoying. The name didn't go on until a month before the film came out. It would have been fine with me if it was always going to be like that. But ultimately, you could say it was a marketing thing. He was already a brand after he'd done the first Batman and Beetlejuice. Yeah, it can be annoying. But most people in Hollywood know I directed it, because I have a long history of connections there.” 

Unfortunately, this has had widespread consequences for Selick’s career. Burton is a household name, and while he may have always been so without The Nightmare Before Christmas, it’s upheld as his most famous and widely beloved work, despite not doing much of the work. This attribution of Burton to the direction or story of Nightmare has led some people to falsely believe that Selick’s other excellent films are also Burton movies, despite having zero involvement. Selick is a brilliant filmmaker, who also directed James and the Giant Peach and wrote and directed Coraline. However, he’s hardly a household name. Instead, people assume that his quirky characters and spooky imagery must be the work of Burton. Thompson, the writer for Nightmare agrees, "Tim, to be perfectly honest, swooped in to be involved with 'Nightmare' but wasn't there by any stretch of the imagination. It was Henry's project. And I sincerely don't feel that Henry has ever really gotten the credit that he's due for it. He did a beautiful, beautiful job." There’s a lot of power in being a household name. To this day, Selick struggles to get his passion projects greenlit because Disney claims they’re too dark to market to kids. 

Closing Thoughts

Not only is Selick’s critical role in making The Nightmare Before Christmas often unacknowledged, but he’s struggled to break out of Burton’s shadow even when it comes to working on films that are entirely his own. Since Burton’s name is synonymous with The Nightmare Before Christmas, people falsely believe that he directed it, wrote it, or had something to do with the animation. In reality, it was a team of people, including hundreds of animators, who transformed a short poem into a visually stunning magical tale. While it’s true that Burton conceived the idea and art style, he wasn’t the end-all-be-all of the movie. He was hardly ever there and doesn’t sound like much of a collaborator given the accounts that Thompson and Selick have to offer. 

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