Tiny Tim dies before your eyes in a new Broadway production of A Christmas Carol, which arrived on Wednesday at the Lyceum Theatre for the holiday season.
Oh, don’t get upset. You know perfectly well that on the final page of the Charles Dickens classic, the reader is informed that Tiny Tim does NOT die.
Still, be advised that the play adapted from it by Jack Thorne throws in a “Christmas Present” scare that sees the frail tyke fatally felled by cold weather on a London street as Tim awaits Bob Cratchit’s long overdue return home from the office, where Scrooge has kept him working late.
An accusing somebody says to clueless Scrooge, “Are you still unaware of the blood on your hands?”
So much for a plum pudding version of the 1843 holiday yarn, huh?
[Read Bob Verini’s ★★★★ review here.]
Thorne, a British writer who in recent seasons has given Manhattan the current Harry Potter and the Cursed Child two-parter, the script for the late King Kong musical, and Sunday, a pensive Gen Y comedy staged at Atlantic Theater, evidently strives to make his Dickens adaptation into a grim and cautionary character study of a mean old moneylender who is redeemed by supernatural intervention.
Thankfully, two of the three holiday spirits are portrayed by the darling likes of Andrea Martin and LaChanze. Still, in spite of their luminescence, Thorne’s version of A Christmas Carol remains something of a finger-wagging drag: Giddy old Fezziwig is no longer a merchant but an undertaker here. The young Ebenezer is smacked around by his brutal father. Scrooge is guided past shuttered establishments that he has foreclosed. A coffin rolls out as Scrooge witnesses his own funeral.
One gets the impression that Thorne invents such dreary business simply so his version of A Christmas Carol is somewhat different than the countless other stage adaptations before it. A high moral tone that infuses the play as several characters chide Scrooge for his behavior stiffens the drama considerably.
Abetted by Hugh Vanstone’s dramatic lighting, production designer Rob Howell conjures up bleak and stormy visuals. Swirling clouds of smoke often fog up the stage while scores of lanterns suspended overhead from chains ominously flicker. Somber mounds of chains and broken lanterns are heaped around the cruciform deck, suggesting the detritus of extinguished lives.
Curiously enough, director Matthew Warchus stages this production—which originated at the Old Vic in London—with various gambits seemingly intended to dispel the general gloom of Thorne’s two-act play.
Although the 15-member company wears dark 1840s clothes, they sufficiently unbend to sing traditional carols and they occasionally romp through dance steps of the period. Even more impressive, everyone adeptly rings out a lovely version of “Silent Night” using hand bells. Throughout the show, an eight-member orchestra performs sonorous musical arrangements crafted by Christopher Nightingale.
Before the performance begins, actors cheerfully wander up and down the aisles, distributing clementines and little packages of cookies among the audience. Late in the show, as the reformed Scrooge trundles toward the humble abode of the Cratchit family, viewers are asked to pass toward the stage various foodstuffs for their banquet such as actual cauliflowers and prop platters of sweetmeats. This makes for some rather jolly moments, if one enjoys that participatory sort of thing.
Along with the ever-endearing Andrea Martin and LaChanze (who inexplicably spices her Ghost of Christmas Present with a Caribbean accent), familiar Broadway faces such as Chris Hoch (Marley), Dashiell Eaves (Cratchit), and Evan Harrington (Fezziwig) pop up among the players. Sporting mutton-chop whiskers, a frayed crimson tailcoat, and a freezing hauteur, Campbell Scott offers a relatively subdued performance as Scrooge. One can’t help but wonder whether this excellent actor is spooked by that past Christmas Carol TV film version in which his father, George C. Scott, played the same role.
A Christmas Carol opened November 20, 2019, at the Lyceum Theatre and runs through January 5, 2020. Tickets and information: achristmascarolbroadway.com
