It’s that time of year again when people pointlessly debate whether The Nightmare Before Christmas is a Christmas or a Halloween movie. The democratic response is that everyone should just take pleasure in it since it is both. Since 95% of it occurs after Halloween and before Christmas, the correct response is that it is a Christmas movie. Such are the facts.
You may not be aware of another debate surrounding The Nightmare Before Christmas, though. The writer of the movie, Caroline Thompson, recently made an appearance on the podcast Script Apart, which interviews authors about the early draughts of well-known films. She discussed a creative disagreement she had with producer Tim Burton over how the villain Oogie Boogie was portrayed. This character also led to a heated argument between director Henry Selick and the Batman director.
Caroline Thompson describes how she begged Tim Burton to change Oogie Boogie because she thought the character had “ugly, dangerous, racist” overtones in the Halloween episode of Script Apart. She provided her viewpoint by saying:
“The Oogie Boogie character looks like a Klansman [from the Ku Klux Klan]. Oogie Boogie is a derogatory term for African Americans in the American south. I begged the powers that be to change something about that character, because of that. I said: this is so ugly and dangerous and antithetical to everything inside me. I did not win that fight… It was a troubling part of the film for me, to be frank. Plus, his song is sang by a black man. So it’s like a trifecta of wrongness. And as I said, I really did beg Tim to reconsider. Particularly the name… it’s a really evil derogatory term. That’s not a fight I won. I think it’s a fun segment of the story as it was executed but it’s a troubling one.”
I find this a little confusing. Even though the burlap material that Oogie Boogie appears to be made out of is less white and more beige, I can understand how someone could think that Oogie Boogie resembles a Klansman (or green when the black lights come on). The word “boogie” (without the Oogie) is a racial slur for Black people, as Thompson is correct in saying. But it doesn’t make sense for a character to resemble a racist Klansman while being called a racial epithet that is used to denigrate the very people that they despise.
Also working against the notion that this is a racist character is the fact that Ken Page, a Black actor, voices the character. You would think that Page wouldn’t have been interested in the role if there had even been a hint that that might be the case. But I suppose that wouldn’t be the first time an actor or actress of colour accepted a role that might have been fraught with racism just to gain a job in a field where minorities frequently struggle to find employment.
Danny Elfman, the music’s composer, was also concerned that the figure may be viewed negatively, particularly by the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). Wikipedia states that Henry Selick’s answer to the criticism that did come from the group was as follows:
“Cab Calloway would dance his inimitable jazz dance and sing ‘Minnie the Moocher’ or ‘Old Man of the Mountain’, and they would rotoscope him, trace him, turn him into a cartoon character, often transforming him into an animal, like a walrus. I think those are some of the most inventive moments in cartoon history, in no way racist, even though he was sometimes a villain. We went with Ken Page, who is a black singer, and he had no problem with it.”
In my opinion, the name Oogie Boogie is just a pun on the boogeyman. He is designed to resemble a sinister ghost made of an old sack. That line of reasoning makes sense given that there are various boogeyman representations, both in the United States and in nations like Hungary, Brazil, Portugal, Bosnia, Croatia, Serbia, and North Macedonia, where the representation of the boogeyman is a person, a woman, or a creature carrying a sack used to kidnap children.
Any associations with racial components appear to be coincidental. After all, even in these more progressive times, no activist groups have consistently promoted this issue, and today, a company like Disney would undoubtedly respond quickly to accusations like that, which is why Disney+ issues warnings about cultural insensitivity for films and TV shows that feature out-of-date representations of specific cultures and people.
Another Creative Clash Over Oogie Boogie
However, this wasn’t the only creative disagreement that occurred in relation to Oogie Boogie. Director Henry Selick had a different idea about who Oogie Boogie might be in another occasion, according to Thompson. The villain in the film is shown to be nothing more than a collection of tiny microscopic bugs as Jack Skellington unravels his cloth form. Selick, though, had another thought. As Thompson clarified:
“Henry and Tim [Burton] had a giant fight over Oogie Boogie where Henry wanted the reveal inside Oogie Boogie to be Dr Finkelstein, manipulating Oogie Boogie rather than the sack of moths.”
Burton wasn’t a fan of that. He actually “flipped out and kicked a hole in the wall then walked out of the room” because he detested the idea so much. If he also exclaimed, “You try to make a dupe out of me?,” Thompson couldn’t corroborate that. However, we’ll just believe that is what took place.
I have to admit that I agree with Burton that that is a bad concept, despite the fact that it is an unneeded reaction to a creative thought. Making Finkelstein the mastermind behind Oogie Boogie doesn’t advance the story in any way, and if anything, it complicates the character needlessly. Given that it’s unclear how they all get together to have a single awareness as Oogie Boogie, replete with a single, enormous booming voice, having Oogie Boogie constructed out of a lot of bugs also doesn’t make much sense. However, in a movie where holidays have their own universes that dwell inside trees, that kind of explanation isn’t really necessary.
However, Thompson claims that these disagreements over ideas caused a rift in her friendship with Tim Burton, and regrettably, the author continues, “It’s not really been fixed.” Burton and Thompson had collaborated on Edward Scissorhands, and even though their friendship may have soured after The Nightmare Before Christmas, they did work together once more on The Corpse Bride. Maybe it would have been better if they had just broken things off completely.
