At the Business College Handelsakademie in Schwaz, on Wednesday November 13, we attended a production of Dickens’s ‘A Christmas Carol’ by TNT Theatre from Bavaria. A lively, vibrant production, if not totally explosive!
At the start we heard the Christmas carol, ‘In the Bleak Mid-Winter’, words by Christina Rossetti. It served as a leitmotif through the performance. A grim, threatening Scrooge (Steven MacNiece) emerged, that cold-hearted, miserly skinflint….cold enough to make us shudder, followed by Bob Cratchit (Jacob Hutchings) rushing to get to work on time: Scrooge threatened him with ‘unemployment’ if he came late.
Three ‘ladies’ call, collecting money as relief for the poor: this was cleverly choreographed, with musical underpinning by accordionist Matthew Wood. The accordion also helped nicely with transitions between scenes, so providing smooth continuity, as did the ‘Ding-Dong’ clock in chorus while Scrooge was undressing for bed. Marley’s head (Tom Martin) protruded through the door, with the knocker held in his mouth, again a clever touch. Marley’s ghost appeared with a locked safe over its head: a clever metaphor, while its departing ‘Remember Me’ sounded like Hamlet’s father!
The Spirit of Christmas Past was a benevolent female figure (Emma Sandborgh), who whisks Scrooge off to old Fezziwig’s surreal party, punctuated by a beery folk-song. Here Scrooge meets Belle again, his former fiancée, played poignantly by Gemma Evans: she appeals to Scrooge to reduce the rents he has imposed on his poor tenants.
The Spirit of Christmas Present, bright green costume with red tinsel, allowed Emma Sandborgh to enliven proceedings with the guessing game. When Mrs Cratchit (Gemma Evans again) says she’d like to hit Scrooge with her ladle, Scrooge reacts by lifting his leg as if struck by the ladle: reality and fantasy coalesce. This production offered several clever examples of such theatrical interplay.
Really moving was Bob Cratchit closely clutching Tiny Tim while ‘In the Bleak Mid-Winter’ was heard again, playing softly. Also telling was the way we experience Scrooge’s gradual reformation, not just at the end as in many productions, but actually during the various scenes.
Curiously, we only met the boy (symbolizing Ignorance), but not the girl (symbolizing Want). The importance of Tiny Tim did emerge, however: “Tiny Tim always brought a ray of sunshine into our lives, even when Scrooge brought a shadow.” And there was pathos in Scrooge’s “I was the corpse nobody mourned”, for we the audience were living through Scrooge reforming himself.
The last part started brightly with ‘Ding, Dong, Merrily on High’: yes, this whole production was partly a musical! Humour abounded here: “Have I been drinking?” is asked in an Irish voice. Comedy is rampant with the massive turkey as a dance partner, as well as Scrooge collapsing after being kissed. Mrs Cratchit sums up the whole story with “You are a much improved man”.
This is a clever, resourceful production, with an element of cheerful comedy. The cast have the challenge of incredibly quick changes of costume and character which they accomplish with brio. The American Drama Group Europe offer creative solutions to a text that is tricky to present. It deserves to be seen far and wide. The loud applause at the end was fully deserved.
Sandra and Andrew (‘Sandrew’) Milne-Skinner ([email protected])
