Peanuts/Trivia


 * Creator Breakdown: Charles Schultz wanted to continue the strip into at least 2002, but his failing health convinced him to retire when he did.
 * Cross-Dressing Voices: Peppermint Patty was voiced by a young boy in several of the cartoons.
 * For the "This is America, Charlie Brown" mini-series (if you want to call it that) from the 1988-89 season, Erin Chase became the only female voice for Charlie Brown.
 * Marcie, "Pig-Pen" and Franklin have also been subject to this trope.
 * Dawson Casting: Averted with the animated productions. Charlie Brown was the only character that would always have a working child actor doing his voice.
 * Executive Meddling: Schulz was never particularly fond of the title "Peanuts", an invention of the syndicate. He was originally going to call it "Lil' Folks", the title of his proto-Peanuts strip, but had to change it because it sounded too much like names of two other strips from the time, Al Capp's Lil' Abner and Little Folks
 * He specifically worried that the title was confusing; people would just ask "Who's Peanuts?", or refer to it as "Charlie Brown" or "Snoopy". And of course, he was completely right.
 * Not that it's justified, but the strip started in the 1950s, when the most popular kids' show was The Howdy Doody Show. And where did kids sit on The Howdy Doody Show? The peanut gallery. The person who chose the title fails logic forever.
 * Hey, It's That Voice!:
 * In the animated version of Snoopy: The Musical, Snoopy was played by Cam Clarke, who would go onto become one of the most prolific voice actors in North America. If you've watched a cartoon in the last 25 years, chances are you've heard his voice.
 * Whenever Snoopy is The Unintelligible, his grunts are provided by none other than Bill Melendez himself.
 * At one time, Charlie Brown was voiced by Chad Allen.
 * Sally was voiced by Fergie in a couple of mid-1980s specials (for which she also sang the image songs - remember the beautiful ballad at Snoopy's wedding?) and a 1992 special had her voice provided by Jodie Sweetin.
 * Jeremy Miller voiced Linus during the mid-1980s.
 * And Taylor Lautner voiced Joe Agate in the 2006 special "He's A Bully, Charlie Brown". Yes, that Taylor Lautner.
 * Pamelyn Ferdin who went on to play Fern in "Charlotte's Web" (1973) was the voice of Lucy in "A Boy Named Charlie Brown" and several TV specials.
 * The 2011 special Happiness Is a Warm Blanket, Charlie Brown has Katie Knight as Patty, Raf as Linus, and Tipo as Pigpen.
 * And for the first run of 'You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown' in 1967, you're invited to imagine the kids not in Minnesota or northern California, but..Ottumwa, Iowa. And imagine that Charlie Brown will be drafted and sent to Korea. That's right, his actor was Gary Burghoff.
 * Speaking of The Musical, the revival had Glinda as Sally.
 * The Japanese dub is a very interesting case (and just like the original English version, overlaps with The Other Darrin) since all the characters were recasted along the years and, until recently, that version avoided the Cross-Dressing Voices trope with many characters, and some of them, like Linus and Schroeder, for some reason, instead of being voiced by kids or women, like the English version, in Japan both kids has being voiced by males normally typecasted in very masculine roles including some famous ones like Nachi Nozawa (Space Adventure Cobra) and even Toshiyuki Morikawa (Linus) and Kenichi Ono (Schroeder)! For sake of simplicity, they are sorted by character and their voice actors, from the older ones to the newer ones:
 * Charlie Brown: Kei Tani, Osami Nabe, Nobuyuki Furuta, Kazuko Sugiyama, Masako Nozawa, Youko Matsuoka (Ginga Izumo), Chika Sakamoto, Atomu Shimojou, Omi Minami (Commercial breaks only) and Motoko Kumai.
 * Sally Brown: Midori Kato, Tomoko Matsushima, Tomoko Saitou, Chie Kojiro (Falcomon), Naoko Matsui, Natsuki Matsuzaki, Takako Sasuga, Kumiko Ohsugi, Hitomi Oikawa, Taeko Kawata, Etsuko Kozakura and Fumiko Orikasa.
 * Lucy Van Pelt: Midori Utsumi, Miyuki Ichijo (Tsubasa Nishikiori), Kumiko Takizawa (Grandis), Roko Takizawa, Katsue Owa, Natsuki Komiya, Michiko Hirai, Kazue Komiya, Yuriko Fuchizaki, Mari Maruta (Cima Garahau) and Ryoko Nagata (Eclair).
 * Linus Van Pelt: Kiyoshi Komiyama, Nachi Nozawa, Yoku Shioya, Kenyuu Horiuchi, Toshihiko Seki, Kazue Ikura, Minori Matsushima (Sayaka Yumi), Yoshiko Ohta (Princess Knight), Keiko Yokozawa (Sheeta), Toshiyuki Morikawa (brutally Playing Against Type here!) and Riko Narumi.
 * Rerun Van Pelt: Satomi Koorogi and Junji Matsuzaki.
 * Peppermint Patty: Youko Hayashi, Tomoko Shinbo, Kyoko Homura, Kazue Ikura, Eiko Yamada (Natasha Romanenko), Remi Okuno, Hiroko Maruyama, Keiko Yamamoto (Mizusu), Masae Osaka and Rika Sugimura.
 * Marcie: Kazuko Magino, Rumiko Ukai (Frau Bow), Satoko Kitou, Yumi Takada, Megumi Hayashibara (also overlaps with Promoted Fangirl), Sanae Kawaguchi, Kazuko Sugiyama and Vanilla Yamazaki (Mesousa).
 * Schroeder: Kaneta Kimotsuki (Suneo), Ryoichi Tanaka (Cancer Deathmask), Bin Shimada, Kenichi Ono, Ai Orikasa, Yasunori Tanaka, Rihoko Yoshida, Minori Matsushima, Keiko Toda, Mie Suzuki, Makoto Naruse and Hana Takeda.
 * Keep Circulating the Tapes: Some specials have still not received a DVD release, notably the live-action/animation blend, "It's The Girl in the Red Truck, Charlie Brown". Though critically panned, some believe it's So Bad It's Good.
 * Screwed By the Network: Although Charles Schulz became a very rich man from the strip, he was never able to buy the copyright back from the syndicate- the price was always just a bit more than he could afford (since 1950 the standard contract has changed; now the copyright for Newspaper Comics automatically reverts to the creator after 20 years).
 * Syndicates owning rights to the comics they distributed was largely standard practice until the 1980s and Bill Watterson's famous fight to prevent Calvin and Hobbes merchandise. After that happened, Creators' Syndicate was founded and comic strip creators owning their work become more common.
 * Most infamously, during a contract dispute, the syndicate hired another cartoonist to draw some Peanuts strips as a threat to Schulz, but thankfully he (and we) never saw them.
 * Tribute to Fido: Snoopy was based on Charles Schulz's childhood dog, Spike. In the 1970s, we meet Snoopy's brother, who is named Spike.