HEAT MISER AND SNOW MISER RETURN IN AN ALL-NEW ANIMATED HOLIDAY SPECIAL, "A MISER BROTHERS' CHRISTMAS," PREMIERING ON ABC FAMILY SATURDAY, DECEMBER 13

Premiere Event Features Mickey Rooney's Reprise of His Role as Santa and George S. Irving's Return as Heat Miser in an All New Stop-Motion Animation Special Based on Characters Originally Appearing in the Rankin-Bass Holiday Classic, "The Year Without a Santa Claus"

Burbank, CA (November 13, 2008) � This year ABC Family proudly presents the new original animated special, "A Miser Brothers' Christmas," premiering Saturday, December 13 (8:00 � 9:00 PM ET/PT) and based upon characters originally appearing in the Rankin-Bass Christmas classic, "The Year Without a Santa Claus." Mickey Rooney returns as the voice of Santa Claus and George S. Irving returns as Heat Miser in a tale of how Santa throws out his back and is unable to deliver gifts for Christmas, threatening to ruin Christmas for children all around the world. This time it's up to the battling brothers Heat Miser and Snow Miser to come together and help save Christmas! The original animated special premieres as part of the network's "25 Days of Christmas" programming event.

The story begins when Santa's new chief mechanic, Tinsel, creates a speedy, new high tech sleigh for Christmas. But what Santa doesn't know is that North Wind has secretly sabotaged the sleigh in the hope of taking Santa's place that year. When Santa takes it out for a spin, he gets caught in the cross fire between the feuding Snow Miser and Heat Miser Brothers and his sleigh comes crashing down. North Wind frames the Miser Brothers for Santa's accident and, with Santa stuck in bed with a bad back, everything falls into place for North Wind to slyly come to the rescue as a temporary Santa. But much to his chagrin, Mother Nature punishes the Miser Brothers by forcing them to put their differences aside and fill in for Santa. In between comedic squabbles, the Brothers rediscover what it means to be family and, along the way, save Christmas for everyone!

"A Miser Brothers' Christmas" was produced by Warner Bros. Animation in association with Cuppa Coffee Studios and is presented by Warner Bros. Animation and ABC Family. Executive producers are Adam Shaheen, Howard Schwartz and Linda M. Steiner, with a script written by Eddie Guzelian ("Lilo & Stitch 2: Stitch Has a Glitch"), and directed by Dave Barton Thomas.

Warner Bros. Animation (WBA) has been producing award-winning original animation since 1930, when it released its first cartoon, "Sinkin' in the Bathtub." Since then, WBA's characters have set the standard for innovative, quality animation. Producing for network and cable television, online, home entertainment and feature films both domestically and internationally, WBA is highly respected for its creative and technical excellence, as well as maintaining the studio's rich cartoon heritage. WBA also oversees the creative use of, and production of animated programming based on classic animated characters from the Hanna-Barbera and DC Comics libraries. WBA is one of the most honored animation studios in history, garnering a grand total of six Academy Awards�, 35 Emmy� Awards, the George Foster Peabody Award, an Environmental Media Award, a Parents' Choice Award, a Humanitas Award, two Prism Awards and 20 Annie Awards.

Part of the Disney-ABC-TV Group, ABC Family, distributed in over 95 million homes, features original movies, series and specials reflecting today's families and entertaining and connecting with adults through relevant stories about today's relationships, all told with diversity, dysfunction, passion, humor and heart. ABC Family's programming is a mix of quality acquired series and theatricals as well as original movies and scripted dramas. ABC Family is also the destination for Holiday events with "13 Nights of Halloween" and "25 Days of Christmas" branded programming events. ABC Family. A New Kind of Family.