For the first time in five decades, the classic stop-motion film "Rudolph the Red-Nose Reindeer" will air on NBC instead of CBS. Here's how to watch.

"Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer," the classic stop-motion animated holiday special, premiered on this day 60 years ago.

Who doesn’t love Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, which has aired annually, except once (in 1999 when a poorly-made decision outraged viewers)? In 1964, the same year the 90-minute sci-fi feature film oddity titled,

NBC is broadcasting the perennial Christmas classic Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer on Friday night. As with every year, families will enjoy the wonderful stop-motion animation and classic songs from the Rankin-Bass production.

In 1964, for NBC and General Electric, that meant a special based on the holiday story "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer," which began life as a poem by Robert L. May in the 1930s and gained more popularity in the 1940s thanks to a song based on the poem by Johnny Marks.