[NEohioPAL] Review of "A Christmas Carol" at GLTF and GLTG

[Bob Abelman]

Dueling Scrooges vie for holiday audiences

 

Bob Abelman

News-Herald, Chagrin Valley Times, Solon Times, Geauga Times Courier

Member, International Association of Theatre Critics 

 

This review appeared in the News-Herald on 12/11/09

 

Charles Dickens' work was so popular in London in the 1840s that there were twelve different stage productions of his Christmas story The Cricket on the Hearth. The very first theatrical adaptation of his A Christmas Carol occurred before the novel was even completed.  

 

He is popular still.  Like the ghosts that visit Ebenezer Scrooge during his one-night transformation from malevolent miser to charitable cherub, there are several productions of A Christmas Carol currently appearing on Cleveland-area stages.   The question is not whether to see one of these staples of the holiday season, but which one to see.

 

The options range from community theatre productions to professional performances, and include the Geauga Lyric Theater Guild's offering in Chardon and the Great Lakes Theater Festival's rendition at PlayhouseSquare, respectively.  Some comparative shopping is in order for this old roasted chestnut of a play.   

 

Comparing community and equity productions may seem like judging apples against oranges.  However, Dickens' himself placed equal value on these fruits when describing their magnificent display in the Christmas shops of Scrooge's neighborhood: "There were Norfolk Biffins (apples), squab and swarthy, setting off the yellow of the oranges in the great compactness of their juicy persons," which were "urgently entreating and beseeching to be carried home in paper bags and eaten after dinner."

 

Both pieces of produce are attractive and tempting in their own right, as are the Geauga Lyric and Great Lakes productions.

 

A Christmas Carol is only as good as its Scrooge.  Some skills are required to convincingly transform from "a squeezing, wrenching, grasping" miser who believes that "every idiot who goes around with a Merry Christmas on his lips ought to be boiled in his own pudding," to a man who "knew how to keep Christmas well."

 

The Geauga Lyric production rates a 7-out-of-10 on the Bah, Humbug Barometer.  Tom Hill, who is reprising the role of Scrooge, delivers blistering sound and fury from his opening line, but he too quickly dissipates into gushing subservience and too easily embraces earnest good will upon his close encounter with the apparitions.  In Hill's defense, he is hampered by an adaptation that replaces brilliant dialogue with the occasional mindless musical number, which significantly waters down the Dickens.

 

The Great Lakes' Aled Davies, who is also returning for his second stint in the lead role, is a full-throttled Scrooge whose metamorphosis is much more methodical, genuine and endearing.  His emotional testimony to "honour Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year" is as good as it gets, earning him a 10-out-of-10 on the Scrooge scale.

 

Another point of comparison is the Cratchit Quotient-the overriding sentimentality that is at the very core of this play.  If hobbled Tiny Tim's catchphrase "God bless us, everyone" doesn't inspire a collective sigh and communal tear from the audience, justice is not being done to Dickens.  

 

In the Geauga Lyric production, 10-year-old Ryan Vincent is the definitive Tiny Tim.  He is natural on stage, has genuine acting chops-having recently appeared in Opera Cleveland's season opener The Barber of Seville-and is as cute as the Dickens.  He is surrounded by a flock of equally adorable urchins that director Lisa-Marie French parades about the beautifully appointed Chardon Theatre. Christmas cheer blankets the room like a thick wave of sublimated dry ice, which deserves a 10-out-of-10. 

 

Eight-year-old Cameron Nelson is a precious and marvelously minuscule Tiny Tim in the Great Lakes offering.  However, many of the child actors in this production suffer from pathological stage-sweetness.  They deliver broadly animated-but-automated smiles, glistening-yet-vacant eyes and fine-but-too-refined performances.  They are little kids playing little kids, not being little kids.  Lots of talent but little warmth emanate from the Ohio Theatre proscenium, resulting in a 6-out-of-10 rating.  

 

Also part of the Cratchit Quotient is the humility generated by the family patriarch.  Great Lakes' Andrew May, who directs this 21st annual production of A Christmas Carol, is also one of the best actors in Cleveland.  He is a moving and memorable Bob Cratchit.  So is Mike Bollinger, whose stage experience does not go beyond Chardon but whose performance in the Geauga Lyric production soars.  He matches May's meekness, sincerity and purity.  Give each production 2 bonus points.  

 

For many, A Christmas Carol is all about the pageantry-the grand party at the Fezziwig's, the festive street scene, the stage magic that manifests and manipulates the visiting spirits.

 

Clearly, the Great Lakes production has superior bells and whistles. It generates the kind of awe one expects from a professionally staged holiday show and absolutely makes the trip downtown worthwhile. The awe factor warrants a 10-out-of-10.  

 

The Geauga Lyric production is modest by comparison, a 7-out-of-10.  However, its small-scale staging is more than sufficient for a small town production.  It nicely captures the festiveness of the holiday season and seeing neighbors and friends join in on this enterprise adds an ingredient that can only be found on the community stage.   Give it 1 bonus point for proving that home is where the heart is for a holiday production.  

 

The play ends with Scrooge avowing to "live in the Past, the Present, and the Future."  So too does A Christmas Carol, in all its forms.



Go see the Great Lakes rendition for its production values.  Go see the Geauga Lyric production for its family values.

 

A Christmas Carol continues through December 23 at PlayhouseSquare's Ohio Theatre and through December 20 at the Geauga Theater in Chardon.  For GLTF tickets, which range from $28 to $59, call 216-241-6000 or visit www.greatlakestheater.org; for GLTG tickets, which range from $12 to $18, call 440-286-2255 or visit www.geugatheater.org.

   
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