A Christmas Carol
Five Things To Love About A Christmas Carol 10 December
In Medias Res
The Enthusiast always appreciates it when things are already afoot onstage as you enter the theater. Though the canny theatergoer takes care never to arrive more than four or five minutes before curtain time, and spends two or three of those minutes setting up an intermission drink, one still ends up staring at the curtain for no little time thereafter. Not so in London as seen at the Lyceum: not only are carolers caroling merrily away as you shuffle in, they’re tossing tangerines and cookies into the audience. (The fact that the cookies in question come in crinkly foil packets is a daring choice, given the well-known ability of a single candy wrapper to drown out even the most mercilessly amplified production; but the audience actually set them aside as the house lights dimmed. The Enthusiast is tempted to trot out the phrase ‘Christmas Miracle.’ I shall not. But I am indeed tempted.)
Brevity
If brevity is the soul of wit, well, this is the wittiest bit of Dickens you could ever hope to see. The Enthusiast generally like his Christmas Carols packed with lines he’s loved ever since growing up with the great televised adaptations (by which I of course mean George C. Scott’s A Christmas Carol, Albert Finney’s Scrooge and Mr. Magoo’s Christmas Carol) but if you’ve ever dreamed of grabbing Dickens by the waistcoat and snapping ‘Cut to the chase, Ghost Boy,’ well, this adaptation (by Jack Thorne of Harry Potter and the Cursed Child fame) will be right up your Camden Town alley. Scrooge (Campbell Scott) never even gets a chance to go home; no sooner has his nephew Fred (Brandon Gill) knocked off a line or two down at the office than Marley (Chris Hoch) rushes in, delivers what feels like maybe nine or ten words of his usually central scene with Scrooge, then takes his leave and it’s off to the ghosts. Or, more accurately, it’s off to two of the three ghosts, because Thorne has trimmed a ghost, too (oh, all right, fine – ‘reimagined’ a ghost). Suffice it to say that a hectoring spirit wrapped in chains isn’t half so terrifying as a writer with a sharp pair of scissors.
Staging
Rob Howell’s staging, combined with Hugh Vanstone’s lighting and Simon Baker’s sound, is a sumptuous delight. Hundreds of glowing lanterns hang above the stage and dangle over the seats at the Lyceum, giving the theater the look of the Great Hall at Hogwarts Castle on an especially jolly Christmas night, and untold tons of metal litters the sides of the stage, making manifest the ponderous chain that Jacob Marley forged in life; dozens of additional chains reach from those scrap heaps to the ceiling. And though the designers are perhaps a wee bit over-pleased with the four doorframes that rise and fall to let us know whether Ebenezer is indoors or out, a stage floor that works like a giant wooden puzzle (with slots to hold boxes used as furniture and other props) is ingenious and useful in equal parts.
Rebirth
Once you buy into the spirit of the whole reinvention thing, it has to be said that Thorne delivers some Christmas crackers here. Scrooge observes in an early scene that ‘Fate is just a concept we use to frighten the poor’ – an aside that has little to do with the story, but would be well worth embroidering on a holiday throw pillow. And an invented scene during Scrooge’s redemption tour of London on Christmas day depicts a tentative rapprochement between Scrooge and the lost love of his life, Belle – a moment of what-might-have-been melancholy that might well have earned a tip of the top hat from Mr. Dickens.
Crush Story
The Enthusiast bows to no man in his enthusiasm for show-themed drinks, and indeed recently whiled away no little time at a 50th Anniversary production of JC Superstar trading imaginary gospel-themed cocktail names with Mrs. Enthusiast. So it is with no little pleasure that I report an especially commodious invention at the Christmas Carol crush bar: The Marley Mule, a Dickensian twist on the classic Moscow Mule (though copper sippy cups are alas not on offer). To you, Mr. Dickens! And to you, Mr. Thorne! Chin-chin!