Knitters create something one stitch at a time—a perfect parallel to Tim Burton’s The Nightmare Before Christmas’s songwriting method. Before there was even a finished script, Danny Elfman was tapped to write the songs for this musical in an unconventional way. Elfman and Tim Burton would meet, and Burton would tell The Nightmare Before Christmas story to him bit-by-bit, in chronological order. Elfman would take a few days to reflect, write a song, then bring it back for approval, and hear the next part of the story. Elfman said, “It’s kind of backwards, but we know what the story is. Let’s see how much of it we can tell in the songs… This is the way musicals were done in the thirties and forties.” Script Writer Caroline Thompson said, “Danny’s songs are so thorough in telling Jack’s story… There’s very little left to do in terms of a script…” Once the script and songs were finalized, animators could begin to work their magic on set.

Do you have the urge to walk through graveyards, sing at the full moon, and wonder about the empty place in your bones? Then, perhaps it’s time to knit yourself a pair of mitts that would do Mister Unlucky, that Pumpkin King with the skeleton grin, proud! Worked in the round from the bottom up with 1x1 ribbed edgings, stranded colorwork recreates the iconic “Jack’s Lament” scene from the film. Increases establish the pin-striped thumb to be put on waste yarn and finished later. Each mitt is worked using a different chart to display more of Jack’s expressive faces on the palm side, and showcase Spiral Hill with Jack backlit by the moon, and Oogie Boogie’s shadow growing on the hand side.

Call out FRIGHTENING FACT: In the film while singing “Jack’s Lament,” Jack removes his head as a reference to Shakespeare’s Hamlet, during the “To be, or not to be” soliloquy where the actor holds a skull.