Horror Icon John Carpenter Has a Surprising Connection to Beloved Christmas Song

Iconic horror filmmaker John Carpenter might be most associated with Halloween, having directed the 1978 movie of the same name and due to his knack for horror, but he has an unexpected connection to Christmas. Carpenter previously took to X (formerly Twitter) to reveal how he’s connected with a classic Yuletide tune, tweeting, “My father Howard Carpenter played violin on Brenda Lee’s ‘JINGLE BELL ROCK.’ He was a member of the Nashville strings.” For any other famous director, this would be little more than a fun bit of trivia. However, because Carpenter has established himself as a master of the macabre, the contrast is pretty hilarious. If only his sci-fi/horror gem The Thing was set in December, we could’ve had Kurt Russell taking on shape-shifting aliens with the aforementioned song playing in the background.

Carpenter’s father was actually a very talented musician. In addition to that hit song under his belt, Howard was the head of Western Kentucky University’s music department, accompanied various plays, was a member of a string quartet, and had performed and recorded with other top musical artists like Roy Orbison and Johnny Cash. Howard tried to get his son into music from a young age; Carpenter told The Ringer in 2023 that “he made me sing in the choir. I wasn’t very happy doing it. Wednesday night choir practice. Sunday morning services. Had to wear a choir robe and all that crap. Oh, my God.”

While Carpenter may not have particularly enjoyed those early forays into music, it undoubtedly rubbed off on him, as he would go on to become one of the most recognizable film score composers of all time. His synth-heavy scores have become staples of his films, many of which are now regarded as classics, including those for Halloween, Escape from New York, Prince of Darkness, and many others. Carpenter even returned to the series that made him famous to provide the music for David Gordon Green’s rebooted Halloween trilogy, adding modern twists to the fan-favorite theme.

From Christmas to Halloween: The Surprising Inspiration Behind Carpenter’s Classic

Carpenter has some other surprising Christmas connections, one of which relates to his seminal horror film that has to do with another holiday, 1978’s Halloween. The film is largely credited with kicking off the slasher movie craze, but it was actually inspired by a similarly styled Black Christmas, released in 1974. Directed by Bob Clark (who would further establish himself in the pantheon of classic Christmas movies with 1983’s A Christmas Story), the film follows a group of sorority sisters stalked by a mysterious murderer over Christmas break. Is it really so hard to wonder how Carpenter could watch this film and ask himself, “What if I changed this film’s setting to Halloween?”

However, Clark is quick to point out that, while his film inspired Halloween, Carpenter’s film is still very much an original creation. Clark told Icons of Fright back in 2005, “The truth is John didn’t copy Black Christmas, he wrote a script, directed the script, did the casting…He liked Black Christmas and may have been influenced by it, but in no way did John Carpenter copy the idea. 15 other people at that time had thought to do a movie called Halloween but the script came to John with that title on it.”

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But Carpenter’s surprising connections to Christmas don’t stop there. In the early 1980s, father-and-son producing duo Alexander and Ilya Salkind – most famous for producing the first three Superman films and 1984’s Supergirl – decided to make a movie about another globally recognized character: Santa Claus. An outline was created and a then-top actor was secured for a role — Dudley Moore, who was hot off the success of the romantic comedy Arthur. New Zealand writer and director Roger Donaldson was briefly considered to helm the film, but the Salkinds opted instead for John Carpenter (for some reason).

Carpenter’s Close Call With Christmas: The Santa Claus Movie

Carpenter was a bizarre choice to direct, as he had mostly worked independently and exerted a fair amount of creative control over most of his movies. In fact, it was his demands that led to the Salkinds to look for other directors. Not only did Carpenter request to scrap their outline and write an entirely new script, he wanted to score the film himself and have final cut. As this was a big-budget film, the Salkinds decided that Carpenter was asking too much, and instead hired Jeannot Szwarc.

While some may believe that Carpenter blew his chance to make what could’ve been a hit film and thus open up more opportunities for his career, history turned out differently. Alas, 1985’s Santa Claus: The Movie was a major flop, was eviscerated by critics, and doesn’t even seem to have enough cheese factor to have developed much of a cult following. After brief forays outside of the horror genre with Starman and Big Trouble in Little China, Carpenter returned to the darker side of cinema to deliver us such classics as Prince of Darkness and They Live, so it’s safe to assume that he dodged an expensive red-and-green bullet by not helming Santa Claus: The Movie.