During my secondary school/sixth form/gap year days I was a member of the Chichester Festival Youth Theatre based at the amazing Chichester Festival Theatre on the South Coast. Towards the end of my membership there the theatre directors decided that the youth theatre would have the prestigious Christmas slot to put on big productions for the public of Chichester and the south coast. What started with ‘The Wizard of Oz’ continued with other well known shows such as ‘Oliver’ and then with the continuing success the youth theatre started to have shows commissioned for them. The latest show was ‘The Snow Queen’ and the show before was a new production of ‘A Christmas Carol’ adapted by Bryony Lavery with music and lyrics by Jason Carr (like wise with ‘The Snow Queen’). When it was announced earlier in the year that the Birmingham Rep were going to be producing their own production of this version of ‘A Christmas Carol’ I was excited to see their interpretation of it.
The production takes a darker tone to the more ‘traditional’ versions of ‘A Christmas Carol’ such as the ‘Scrooge Musical’ transporting the story into that of a ghost story. As well as the ghosts of past, present, future and Marley the stage is also occupied by ‘grey ghosts’ who seem to dictate to Scrooge what he should do and help him work, get dressed and go to bed. This feature was heavily used in Chichester’s production (with a cast of 70 it also helped ensure that all in the cast played an active part) and was again used in Birmingham Rep’s production, but more low key (due to a smaller cast) but just as well done.
I went in a bit dubious that the production wouldn’t live up to that of Chichester’s but then again I went in biased towards my friends down in Chichester. However I left with a great big smile and with a warm Christmassy feeling (even though I went to see it at the start of January!)
The opening scenes where Scrooges office is wheeled onto the stage showed from the outset the the lighting and other stage effects were going to be used to their very best advantage. The light beams shimmering through the smoke and the gaps in the office structure creating a strong opening image to the show which carried on throughout the show using the gauze curtain to help the back lighting of the ghost of Christmas yet to come have a strange shimmer to it to help enhance the imagery on the stage.
The songs by Jason Carr include some songs that just float along with the dialogue whereas there are a couple of songs that stand out, most notably the ‘Christmas Goose’ and ‘Yes and No’ songs that show how much Christmas means to the Cratchits and Scrooge’s nephew Fred in the ghost of Christmas present segment of the show.
The cast are led by former Birds of a Feather star Peter Polycarpou who does a great job at portraying a cranky man who is fed up with the world trying to force Christmas down his throat but reacting in an extreme way. The rest of the ensemble cast flip between roles quickly and effortlessly with members of the Young Rep playing the younger, smaller roles well. Having seen Rosalie Craig and Sévan Stephan in the West End production of ‘Lord of the Rings‘ it was
great to see them again in this production with Rosalie’s Mrs Cratchit performing a heartfelt plea against thanking Scrooge for the small Christmas meal they had in the song ‘The Toast’.
The finale of the show, when Scrooge decides that Christmas isn’t that bad after all and to start to right the wrongs he has made used the whole theatre with a couple of cast members walking down the steps in the auditorium was a great touch (and one that is used regularly in Chichester due to its layout) and I felt as though it could have been used more as its an effective way to incorporate the audience into the action. The final image of the show of the entire cast singing ‘Merry Christmas Everybody’ with the dreary grey set transformed into a sea of colour and decorations with added confetti was the perfect ending for the show.
Although I want to say the original Chichester production was better, I have to say that they were both on par with each other and say that Chichester was the best youth theatre production of ‘A Christmas Carol’ I’ve seen and that Birmingham had the best professional version. Its only on till 9th January 2010 so if you’re in Birmingham I suggest you try and get to see it – and it’ll even make you feel Christmassy again!!
A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens, adapted by Bryony Lavery with music & lyrics by Jason Carr is at The Birmingham Rep theatre until January 9th 2010 – www.birmingham-rep.co.uk
