The following is taken from Elf Unwrapped: Behind the Scenes of a Modern Christmas Classic – Andy Richter’s oral history of the making of Elf, the film that became a holiday classic, by Andy Richter (who had a small role in the hit 2003 comedy) with Aaron Karo.
Elf’s story begins like most Christmas stories: with a Jewish child in Philadelphia. In 1993, David Berenbaum, an aspiring screenwriter, left Philadelphia for Los Angeles with dreams of making it big. He had no connections, no experience and, for the most part, no idea how to succeed in “the business”. But what he did have was a vivid imagination and a brain brimming with fanciful ideas.
David was an arrogant dreamer, like many of us when we land in Hollywood, but David felt completely out of his element. Compared to the East Coast, Los Angeles is only . . . weird. No one seems to have a real job here, but they all talk like they’re showbiz big guys. People act like they’re your friend, but then look past you in the middle of a conversation, just in case someone better walks by. David felt lonely, especially with the holidays coming up – which are even stranger in Los Angeles. Suddenly it was an ungodly 8-5 degrees around Christmas time! To cope, he rented a bunch of Christmas movies on VHS so he could watch them over and over again. He had fun with classics like It’s a wonderful life, Miracle on 34th Street, Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer – anything to make it feel a little more Christmassy. Feeling inspired, he sat down to write his first Christmas movie: a zany romantic comedy called Christmas in New Jersey, which centered around two people experiencing the worst days of their lives, who decide to completely start over as if they were never born (very It’s a wonderful life code).
Elf unboxedby Andy Richter with Aaron Karo
Dey Street Books
Luckily for him, this scenario was actually optioned – which is when a production company or studio pays you a little money for the “option” of one day making the movie and then paying you a lot of money. Unfortunately, 99% of optional projects never happen, and that was the case for Christmas in New Jersey. The good news, though, is that it opened a ton of doors for David. Impressed by the quality of his writing, the film executives he met kept asking him, “Okay, what’s next?” “Following??” David thought. “Damn, I better find something else!” Luckily, he was still in that Christmas spirit when he started working on his next big idea: the screenplay that would become Elf.
When David started writing Elf in 1995, he wrote to specifications. In Hollywood terms, “spec” means “speculative” – in other words, no one was paying him to write this script, so he was doing the work for free, hoping to be able to sell it later. And while he really enjoyed the holiday movies he watched, it was ultimately a 1964 Rankin Bass TV special that really inspired this particular project.
For some context: Rankin Bass was this quirky little production company that essentially dominated Christmas TV programming for about twenty years. If you are a fan of Elf (and holiday movies in general), you’ll probably recognize their films right away. They specialized in stop-motion specials, the kind in which the puppets move frame by frame. Their most famous production, Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeerhas been broadcast on television every December since LBJ has been in the White House. But they also did Frosty the Snowman, Santa Claus is Coming to Town, And The year without Santa — basically, all those jerky yet very magical holiday staples that seem like fever dreams these days, but have absolutely shaped everyone’s idea of what Christmas looks and sounds like.
Rankin Bass’s interpretation of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer (adapted from a 1939 booklet published by the Montgomery Ward department store) follows the age-old story of Rudolph, a poor reindeer who is made fun of by all the other reindeer because of his very shiny, shiny red nose. After these evil tyrants chase him away, he comes across a fellow misfit named Hermey, an elf who aspires to become a dentist. Rejected by their peers in Santa’s workshop, they set out on an adventure, stumbling upon the Island of Misfit Toys and meeting now-classic characters like the Abominable Snow Monster along the way. When they finally return home, Rudolph ends up saving Christmas by using his nose to guide Santa’s sleigh through a terrible snowstorm, proving that what made Rudolph different is exactly what made him special.
David knew what it was like to be a misfit; after all, it wasn’t that long ago that he was working in a lingerie store and sweating in eighty-five degree heat on Christmas. Essentially, he saw himself in Rudolph and wanted to create his own character that would follow a similar hero’s journey. Rudolph’s innocence also reminded David of Josh Baskin, Tom Hanks’ character in Big: a slightly fanciful weirdo who doesn’t really fit in. Thanks to his wish granted by a magical fortune-telling machine, Josh is literally taller than all his peers, and that’s also what sparked the idea of a giant (well, human-sized) elf named Buddy.
So, at this point, David has an idea with a big hook: a human raised as an elf in the North Pole. It’s a fun concept, it’s full of potential for physical humor, and it also has that “fish out of water with a Christmas twist” angle that hasn’t really been done before. But as excited as he was at that moment, David knew he had to flesh it out a lot more. He didn’t want it to be just a one-note gag. Plus, after watching all those Christmas movies, he realized that the ones that really stuck around — the ones that made it to the pantheon — had a little something extra.
In the original versions of the storyline, when Buddy left the North Pole in search of his human family, his mother and father were still alive. This had a few problems, namely that it required a lot more explanation. It seems believable that a man doesn’t know he has a child, but what was mom doing for the last thirty years? Are you looking for her missing baby? Or just get on with life, sipping margs by the pool and pretending like nothing happened? Either way, it doesn’t really scream “very fun.”
So David decided to follow in the footsteps of Cinderella and Snow White and almost every Disney movie and Grimm’s fairy tale – and killed Buddy’s mother. Focusing the storyline on Buddy’s relationship with his father made a lot of sense from a story perspective, but more than that, it was a deeply personal choice for David. His father had died when he was young, and this idea of Buddy searching for his father really appealed to him.
Ultimately, it was this emotional yet endearing line that elevated Elf from a fun premise or silly sketch to a full-fledged film with the potential for real staying power. Before, the drafts seemed a lot more far-fetched, but with this final piece in place, the script finally morphed into what he always wanted it to be: a holiday comedy with a lot of heart.
DAVID BERENBAUM, SCREENPLAY: I just came back to what would be the most personal connection for me – the passing of my father – which is why I made this choice. Once I discovered this, writing became a much easier and I had something that I thought was good. Plus, I thought that, in a comedic way, it would be funny if Buddy said, “I’m here, Dad!”
In 1996, after writing many (many, many, many) drafts of the script, David sold his screenplay for millions of dollars, and the move to production went smoothly.
Joke!
Of course, that’s not what happened. Instead, the film got stuck in “development hell,” the term for projects in Hollywood that languish with production companies and studios for years and never get the green light.
First of all, Elf was optioned by the Motion Picture Company of America (aka MPCA), a production company known for making critically acclaimed classics like the Oscar-nominated film. Ulee’s gold (with Peter Fonda) and Beverly Hills Chihuahua 2 (with George Lopez). It was while MPCA held the reins that the very first actor was attached (or, in Hollywood parlance, “verbally agreed”) to play Buddy: the one and only Chris Farley, fresh out of school. Saturday evening live. Once on board, David began refining the script with Chris in mind, and at several points he even had to sit down with Chris himself so they could go over the new material. Alas, this meeting never materialized and after a year, MPCA’s exclusive option period expired, relegating Chris Farley’s storyline to Elf to Hollywood legend.
Then another production company opted for Elfbut after that effort didn’t work either, the revised script got David accepted into Disney’s prestigious writing program. This program brings in a few writers each year and asks them to rewrite whatever is in production at that time. It’s a trial by fire, Disney style, but it’s also an incredible opportunity. David spent two years there, working on whatever they threw at him; in fact, a film he wrote there — The haunted mansionwith Eddie Murphy, released a few weeks later Elf. During this period, Disney also had the opportunity to make Elfbut alas, once again, for the countless and inscrutable reasons most Hollywood projects die, it never came to fruition.
Fortunately, waiting to bring Elf life would soon be over, once a fairy godmother in the form of another SNL legend arrived.
The people who finally brought Elf At…
Gn entert
