The cartoon of Alexander Tatarsky about a man who went to the woods in search of a tree, for many years is an indispensable attribute of New Year's holidays. Today it is difficult to imagine why in the 80s the humor of Tatarsky was not simply not appreciated, and even did not want to release a cartoon on the screens. After accusations of Russofobia and ridicule of the Soviet people, the author was in a pre-infarct state.

Problems with censorship arose in Tatarsky during the work on the first cartoon - "Plastyline Varna". He was allowed to shoot it exceptionally – for helping to develop animated screenshots for the Olympics-80 on television. But when the cartoon was ready, it was banned from showing with the formulation “ideologically idle.” The situation was saved by Eldar Ryazanov and Ksenia Marinina, who at the time worked on the program "Cinopanorama" - in spite of the ban, they released the cartoon on the air. Furthermore, the recognized success of the animator was the plasticine screenshot for the program "Good night, baby!", which entered the Guinness Book of Records for the number of broadcasts.

Inspired by this success, Tatarsky took on the creation of a new cartoon – “Falled last year’s snow” by the script of Sergey Ivanov. There were even more claims from the censors. The author recalled: “This film was generally banned, placed on the shelf, and the formulations were much more disgusting. If “Vorona” is just an idyllic nonsense, then it is already Russofobia, bullying of the Soviet man. Because in the film there is only one hero, and he is Russian (he is in a hat, a man), and at the same time he is an idiot. The man seemed to them a fool and a fool, and the story was a laugh at the whole people. Places the cartoon had to re-sound and re-assemble.

Composer Grigory Gladkov, who wrote the music for the cartoon, explained the idea of the authors: "The power of the cartoon is that the character is shown. He’s such a dumb man, in fact he’s a normal, wise village man, and she’s his loving wife. If I didn’t love it, I’t run with a rock. He was running, looking and worrying. The man found the tree and brought it home, but it was already in April, and he brought it back. It is our whole life and our whole character so untouchable, but we build rockets, and we will hold the Olympics, and we still get it. We do everything with fun and joking. The most important thing is that the hero is an inventor, don’t let God live with boring people.”

Initially, it was planned that there would be no text in the cartoon at all, only the outcry of "Oh" and "Ah". But the management of the studio demanded to “explain this nonsense” and insisted that the plot be more specific. Alexander Tatarsky together with screenwriter Sergey Ivanov began to come up with replicas of the heroes. Many phrases from the cartoon, which then went to the people, had to defend with battle. For example, Kramola was seen in the phrase "Who is here, for example, in the king extreme? No one? So I will be the first!" in the replicas of the main character, the censors felt encrypted messages.

The problems continued after the film was finished. The actor Stanislav Sadalsky was invited to the voice, but his name had to be removed from the titles. The fact is that Sadalsky grew up in a nursery and tried all his life to find his relatives. In the mid-1970s he managed to find his cousin grandmother, who emigrated to Germany in 1917. When they finally managed to meet, Sadalsky for communication with a foreigner was forbidden to go abroad, and as a punishment his name was ordered to be removed from the titles of the cartoon. The audience immediately recognized his voice.

The paradoxical phrase “Last year’s snow fell” seemed to Tatarsky the ideal title for a cartoon with absurd humor, especially since this phrase he found a quite logical explanation – “last year” can be considered snow, which fell on December 31. Stanislav Sadalsky recalled: “All our absurd, fantastic film he built on one phrase he thought was brilliant: “Last year’s snow fell.” For a long time he tried to explain to me, “You understand... zero hours, zero minutes. There is no past, no future, no present. There is time, there is world. Everything is frozen. And the snow is coming... Last year, you know?”
As a result, the cartoon "Falled last year's snow" still came out on the screens - on the eve of the New 1984 year. Later it became a recognized classic of the Soviet animation and one of the most famous works of Alexander Tatarsky.

During the discussion of the final musical theme, the animator asked composer Grigory Gladkov to write a penetrating melody: "Error, the cartoon is funny, but at the end there must be a sad melody. It should be like Fellini, it should be very fun, and at the end such a sad melody, under which we and you will be buried."

In 2007, the director died – at the age of 56 he stopped his heart, and, according to his will, the funeral sounded music from his most famous cartoon.