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| The spectacular stage set of Center Theatre Group’s “A Christmas Carol” |
Disclaimers: The photo above was taken before they came out to tell everyone NOT to take any photos. Also, everyone in the theatre was tested for vaccination status and remained masked throughout. Your trusty critic has not been in a location with this many people inside since before the pandemic.
Everyone knows the story of “A Christmas Carol.” It has brightened many a Christmas —in book form, in TV and movie form, and certainly with many, many theatre productions. As such, there are certain things one expects from one’s “Christmas Carol.” In many ways, this production did not disappoint, but alas, in many other ways, it did.
More disclaimers: I despise, with a seething hot passion, art which breaks the fourth wall. Hate it on TV. Hate it onstage.
So I hated the beginning of this show a lot. A lot. It starts with the ensemble throwing fruit into the audience, which is particularly cruel, as we are all dutifully masked up, and have been instructed not eat anything inside.
What I want to see at the beginning of “A Christmas Carol” is how darn crotchety old Scrooge is. Let me just see him being nasty. Introduce me to the characters in his world. What we get instead is a chorus of people onstage telling us how crotchety Scrooge is, like a Greek chorus. Damn, I hated that part.
But, the reason I plunked down ducats for season tickets to Center Theatre after being cooped up in pandemic mode for almost two years is one thing: Bradley Whitford, one of my favorite actors, is Scrooge. And he is (as expected) phenomenal. He hits all the notes you expect him to hit. He is just superb.
An added bonus: Kate Burton is the Ghost of Christmas Past. She is also phenomenal.
More disclaimers: I think everyone everywhere should be using more women in casts, and have more diversity: on TV, in films, in theatres, in politics, in statehouses, in corporate board rooms. Diversity is essential to our country’s wellbeing.
That said, a lot of this show didn’t work for me. I know I’m an old-school theatre person, and many arguments could be made about how diversity is better, but some things FOR ME just don’t work in the story. Like it or hate it, I do think a crotchety man like Scrooge would more likely listen to men (as his ghosts) for example. He is definitely a big part of the patriarchy.
So, for me, I don’t think you can just trade out roles —as much as I loved Kate Burton in this. All of his ghosts are women, in fact. One of them, inexplicably, is a Southern Black woman who wants to be known as “Brenda,” also inexplicably (though it does get a laugh).
One is his sister, Fan, who is also (inexplicably) Black. Truthfully, I’d rather see an all-Black cast of “A Christmas Carol,” cause that would make more sense. Maybe the time of Dickens had more Black citizens than I know about, but the mixture is still always jarring to me, when it’s from that time period.
So, as you can see, a lot of these things threw me out of the story. I also felt, even though there were a couple replications of Scrooge’s nastiness, it wasn’t really grounded. Too much of the story was explained by the crazy Greek chorus thing, instead of showing us the actions.
There is another part where Scrooge is talking to one of the characters who is essentially in one of the balconies. Irritating.
I blame three men for the choppiness of all this: the one who “originally conceived and directed” it, Matthew Warchus, the current director, Thomas Caruso, and the man who adapted it, Jack Thorne. This is where the diversity of women would be gladly felt, in one of these three roles. (There are, for example, many times when Witford is presenting a really great dramatic moment, but his back is to the audience. UGH.)
There are a lot of things about this production that irritated me. But then, there were the magical moments. For example, in showing Scrooge his past, there was an actor (Harry Thornton) playing the young Scrooge, and there are wonderful bits of blocking and stage play, where Bradley Witford turns into the young Scrooge. Loved that part so much.