Must-See Musical Holiday TV Shows and Movies This Month

To kick off the official holiday season, country star Dolly Parton released her latest holiday offering, a 90-minute new musical movie, Mountain Magic Christmas, via NBC.

Videos by American Songwriter

The playful, meta, and cozy film depicts the story of what it’s like to make a holiday movie. It’s a movie about a movie, featuring artists like Jimmy Fallon, Miley Cyrus, Willie Nelson, and more.

Parton, who is the current American Songwriter magazine cover star, also has a new holiday album out this month, A Holly Dolly Christmas (Deluxe Edition). But what other musical holiday TV shows and movies are out there to check out?

While there are popular musical holiday specials available on streaming services—like A Charlie Brown Christmas and Christmas at Pee Wee’s Playhouse (featuring Grace Jones, Charro, KD Lang, and others) on Apple+ and the original 1996 version of How the Grinch Stole Christmas on Peacock—there are others that will be broadcast on network TV (read: not requiring streaming services).

CBS offers the following schedule:

December 10
Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer
8/7c

Frosty the Snowman
9/8c

Frosty Returns
9:30/8:30c

December 11
National Christmas Tree Lighting: Celebrating 100 Years
8/7c

December 20
Mariah Carey: Merry Christmas To All! 
8/7c

December 31
New Year’s Eve Live: Nashville’s Big Bash
8-10p and 10:30p-1:30a

NBC offers the following schedule:

Along with Dolly’s special (mentioned above, with an encore on NBC on December 21 at 8 p.m.), she will be joining her goddaughter Miley Cyrus for a New Year’s Eve celebration.

December 23
How the Grinch Stole Christmas
8 p.m.

Dolly Parton’s Christmas of Many Colors: Circle of Love
9-11 p.m.
(It’s the sequel to Parton’s NBC movie Coat of Many Colors.)

December 26
Parton’s Coat of Many Colors
8-10 p.m.

ABC offers the following schedule

December 8

Santa Claus Is Comin’ to Town
8:00-9:00 p.m.

CMA Country Christmas             
9:00-10:01 p.m.            

December 14

A Very Backstreet Holiday
8:00-9:00 p.m.    

December 15         

Beauty and the Beast
8 p.m.

December 20

Santa Claus Is Comin’ to Town
8:00-9:00 p.m.              

December 23

Mickey Saves Christmas
8:00-8:30 p.m.              

Olaf’s Frozen Adventure
8:30-9:00 p.m.              

December 25

Disney Parks Magical Christmas Day Parade
10:00 a.m-12:00 p.m. ET/ 7:00-9:00 a.m. PT        

December 31

Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve with Ryan Seacrest 2023
8:00-10:00 p.m.             “

Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve with Ryan Seacrest 2023
10:30 p.m.-2:13 a.m.  

Photo by NDZ/Star Max/GC Images

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