The Narrator Nobody Heard in The Nightmare Before Christmas

A Very Tough Voice to Cast

Vincent Price was supposed to be Santa Claus. He had actually recorded the part, but according to Henry Selick, Price "had just lost his wife, and he was despondent, and it just didn't work"¹. The production moved on to Don Ameche, whom Selick remembered as "insanely grouchy"¹. Then they tried James Earl Jones, and that went worse: when Danny Elfman told Jones the part had been written especially for him, Jones snapped back, "You don't know me!"¹

Selick still needed a voice for the beginning and end of the film, a voice meant to be Santa Claus bookending Jack Skellington's story¹. The man who eventually got the job wasn't a star at all. He was, as Selick put it, "a local actor from San Francisco"¹. That casting decision is the one audiences actually hear in theaters, but it wasn't the only recording made for the part.

The project had started over a decade earlier as a three-page poem Tim Burton wrote in 1982, while he was a Disney animator fresh off the success of his short film Vincent³. Burton originally pictured his favorite actor, Vincent Price, reading the whole thing as a television special³. Disney shelved the idea as too strange, Burton got fired from the studio in 1984, and the poem sat for years until Burton, by then a bankable director after Beetlejuice and Batman, made a development deal with Disney in 1990³. Because he was tied up directing Batman Returns and preparing Ed Wood, Burton handed the stop-motion production to Henry Selick, his old Disney colleague, and the poem's narration was initially meant to carry much more of the storytelling weight than it ultimately would^3,4.

Somewhere in that process, Patrick Stewart came in to read it. By the early 1990s Stewart was already a Royal Shakespeare Company veteran and internationally known as Captain Jean-Luc Picard on Star Trek: The Next Generation⁵. What he recorded was not the brief lines heard in the finished film. It was a longer prologue and a full epilogue, framed around the idea that Santa Claus himself would open the story and return at the end to finish Burton's poem¹. Selick described the intent plainly in a 2013 interview with The Daily Beast: "It's supposed to be Santa Claus's voice at the beginning/end"¹.

That ending never worked the way the filmmakers wanted. Selick said of the planned closing narration, "Then, later in the film, it was supposed to go to Santa Claus finishing the poem at the film's end, but that didn't work either, so we scrapped it"¹. As the film leaned more on Jack Skellington's own songs and dialogue and less on Burton's poem as a direct narration, the elaborate framing device Stewart had recorded no longer fit the shape of the movie⁴. The role went instead to Ed Ivory, the same actor who voices Santa, or "Sandy Claws" in Jack's mangled pronunciation, inside the story itself^1,2.

Stewart's performance did not disappear. It is sitting, and has been since October 12, 1993, on the film's official soundtrack album from Walt Disney Records, credited on the tracks "Opening," which comes right after the overture, and "Closing," the nineteenth track, just before the end titles¹. A later home-video release added a separate reading of Burton's original poem as a bonus feature, though that one is read by Christopher Lee, not Stewart, despite some accounts crediting it to him^1,2. Anyone curious about the voice the filmmakers couldn't quite fit into the finished movie only has to put on the record.

Who's Who

• Patrick Stewart: Recorded the extended Santa Claus prologue and epilogue narration, unused in the film but preserved on the soundtrack¹.
• Tim Burton: Wrote the original 1982 poem and produced the film; directing duties went to Henry Selick³.
• Henry Selick: Directed the film and gave the only firsthand account of why the narration casting changed¹.
• Danny Elfman: Composed the score and songs, and was present when James Earl Jones walked away from the Santa role^1,3.
• Ed Ivory: San Francisco-based actor who voices Santa Claus and performs the narration actually heard in the theatrical film^1,2.

What's Still Fuzzy

Selick's Daily Beast account is the fullest firsthand explanation of the casting search, but it never mentions Patrick Stewart directly¹. No source gives a date for when Stewart recorded his version, and no firsthand account explains exactly why his material, rather than simply being shortened, was dropped entirely¹.

Some secondary sources, including Looper's reporting, suggest more generally that Burton decided the finished film did not need extensive narration as it evolved into a character-driven musical⁴. That is consistent with how the production changed over time, but it is not the same as a documented decision specifically about Stewart's recording.

There is also a persistent mix-up about which actor reads Burton's original poem on home video. Several accounts describe it as Stewart's work, but the 2008 Collector's Edition Blu-ray bonus feature was read by Christopher Lee¹.

Timeline

1. 1982Tim Burton writes the original three-page poem while working as a Disney animator³.
2. 1990Burton makes a development deal with Walt Disney Studios after learning the studio still owns the rights³.
3. 1991Production begins in July under Burton and Denise Di Novi, with Henry Selick directing³.
4. 1993Patrick Stewart records an extended prologue and epilogue as the voice of Santa Claus; it goes unused in the finished film¹.
5. October 12, 1993Walt Disney Records releases the film's soundtrack, with Stewart credited on 'Opening' and 'Closing'¹.
6. October 29, 1993The Nightmare Before Christmas receives its wide theatrical release, with narration performed by Ed Ivory³.
7. 2013Henry Selick gives his account of the casting search, including Stewart's predecessors, to The Daily Beast¹.

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