The First Christmas: The Story of the First Christmas Snow falls during the pageant works a small miracle. The film contains a performance of Irving Berlin's "White Christmas". The film's title actually refers to the Christmas pageant the orphan children presented on Christmas Eve, though the title could also refer to the first time Lucas actually experiences snow after his sight returns. It originally premiered on December 19, 1975 on NBC. In later years, it aired on CBS, usually as the last Rankin/Bass special aired for the season. Freeform once aired the special each year during its "25 Days of Christmas" programming block, but AMC has now taken over broadcast
White Christmas (film) screen, has made it possible to endow "White Christmas" with a fine pictorial quality. The colors on the big screen are rich and luminous, the images are clear and sharp, and rapid movements are got without blurring—or very little—such as sometimes is seen on other large screens. Director Michael Curtiz has made his picture look good. It is too bad that it doesn’t hit the eardrums and the funnybone with equal force." "Variety" liked it: ""White Christmas" should be a natural at the boxoffice, introducing as it does Paramount’s new VistaVision system with such a hot combination as Bing Crosby,