A Christmas Carol – A Ghost Story (NHB Modern Plays) E-Book

Charles Dickens.

• Herausgeber: Nick Hern Books
• Kategorie: Poesie und Drama
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2021

Seitenzahl: 99

Beschreibung

It's Christmas Eve. As the cold, bleak night draws in, the penny-pinching Ebenezer Scrooge is confronted by the spirit of his former business partner, Jacob Marley. Bound in chains as punishment for a lifetime of greed, the unearthly figure explains it isn't too late for Scrooge to change his miserly ways in order to escape the same fate. But first he'll have to face three more eerie encounters... Mark Gatiss' spine-tingling adaptation is faithful to the heart and spirit of Charles Dickens' much-loved festive ghost story – with an emphasis on the ghostly. Commissioned by Nottingham Playhouse, the adaptation premiered there in 2021, starring Nicholas Farrell alongside Gatiss, and directed by the theatre's Artistic Director, Adam Penford. A Christmas Carol – A Ghost Story subsequently transferred to Alexandra Palace Theatre, London, produced by Eleanor Lloyd Productions and Eilene Davidson Productions.

Leseprobe

Charles Dickens

A CHRISTMAS CAROL – A GHOST STORY

adapted for the stage by

Mark Gatiss

NICK HERN BOOKS

London

www.nickhernbooks.co.uk

Contents

Introduction

Original Production Details

A Christmas Carol – A Ghost Story

About the Authors

Copyright and Performing Rights Information

IntroductionMark Gatiss

‘Christmas,’ wrote Charles Dickens’ daughter ‘was always a time which in our home was looked forward to with eagerness and delight. And to my father it was a time dearer than any other part of the year.’

The sheer power and joy of Dickens’ story – and the restless energy with which it was produced – has ensured that the tale of Ebenezer Scrooge and his ghostly visitors has assumed the quality of myth. It’s also, from its inception, proven incredibly popular to dramatise. So why another version?

I’ve been obsessed with A Christmas Carol since I was four years old and went to see the Albert Finney film at my local Odeon. Well, my first actual encounter with the story had actually been Carry On Christmas on TV the year before! But I can vividly remember sitting in the red plush (ish) seats of the cinema knowing that this was going to be the real thing. The proper scary story. And being, frankly, terrified in anticipation. The film left a profound impression on me, made even stronger by seeing, in short order, the brilliant Alistair Sim version and Richard Williams’ beautiful short cartoon.

Something about the story spoke deeply to me, as it has to generation after generation. Its combination of optimism, sentiment, pain and melancholy, all somehow, magically, combined into the perfect Christmas story. Bitter-sweet, indeed, like Christmas itself. When I finally read Dickens’ actual story I was knocked out. Not just by the genuine jollity and warmth (it is a carol after all, divided not into chapters but into staves), but by its sheer power. Righteous anger courses throughout and certain passages – Bob Cratchit breaking down sitting at the bedside of his dead son, the terrifying Children, Ignorance and Want – remain long in the memory. But there’s something else, something which lies at the heart of my adaptation. Because while it’s true to say that this wonderful story in many ways reinvented the traditions of Christmas and the popular appetite for them, it’s also true that its status as a ghost story has been somewhat undervalued.

There had been ghosts before A Christmas Carol, of course, but being the literary magician that he was, Dickens somehow contrived to concentrate an entire, very English tradition into one story. The doomed and repentant Jacob Marley is the closest we have to a revenant, a spectral visitor returned from the grave, clanking his chains and owing, I would say, a substantial debt to the ghost of Hamlet’s father.

Christmas Past, is described as a ‘strange figure… like a child but not so like a child as like an old man’, constantly receding and approaching from sight with a blazing light burning from its head. It seems to represent memory itself, blurring and shifting unreliably, stirring up old wounds and old joys.

Christmas Present is an altogether different proposition, seeming to tap into a more Pagan Christmas: a great substantial, rather terrifying lover of life. A ghost of appetites, sprinkling kindness from its burning torch yet, within its massive frame, also sheltering Mankind’s neglected children, which cling to it for refuge.

And Christmas Yet to Come, whom Scrooge fears more than all the others, is a dark spectral shape, as unknowable as the future. Often characterised as Death itself, the Ghost actually possesses a very human hand, not a skeletal claw, which ultimately trembles as though moved by Scrooge’s final entreaties.

These four spectres form the spine of the narrative, taking Scrooge on his epic journey from ‘covetous old sinner’ to the redeemed soul we see at the end. But the story teems with ghosts. The ghosts of regret and lost love, of broken friendships and ignorant mistakes, of heartbreak and loss. In this adaptation, amongst the ‘pleasing terrors’ of an evening spent in spectral company, I hope we will all find our own joys and restored hopes, seeing in Ebenezer Scrooge that it’s never too late.

There is an old proverb. The best time to plant a tree was twenty years ago. The second best time… is now.

Merry Christmas!

This adaptation of A Christmas Carol – A Ghost Story by Mark Gatiss was commissioned by Nottingham Playhouse and first performed there on 2 November 2021 (previews from 29 October), with the following cast and creative team:

EBENEZER SCROOGE

Nicholas Farrell

JACOB MARLEY

Mark Gatiss

FRED

James Backway

CAROLINE

Angelina Chudi

GHOST OF CHRISTMAS PAST

Jo Eaton-Kent

TINY TIM

Zak Ford-Williams

BELLE

Aoife Gaston

NARRATOR

Christopher Godwin

BOB CRATCHIT

Edward Harrison

MRS CRATCHIT

Sarah Ridgeway

GHOST OF CHRISTMAS PRESENT

Joe Shire

GRACE CRATCHIT

Renae Rhodes/ Esmé Tchoudi

EDWIN CRATCHIT

Lauren Tanner/ Charlie Westlake

Director

Adam Penford

Designer

Paul Wills

Lighting Designer

Philip Gladwell

Sound Designer

Ella Wahlström

Video Designer

Nina Dunn

Movement Director

Georgina Lamb

Composer

Tingying Dong

Illusion Designer

John Bulleid

Illusion Designer Associate

Will Houstoun

Casting Director

Sam Stevenson CDG

Puppet Designer & Director

Matthew Forbes

Musical Director

Tom Attwood

Voice Coach

Kay Welch

Associate Director

Jasmine Teo

Costume Supervisor

Joan Hughes

Wig and Make Up Supervisor

Moira O’Connell

Head Production Video Engineer & Video Programmer

Harrison Cooke

Production Managers

Andy Bartlett, Pete Kramer

Company & Stage Manager

Jane Eliot-Webb

Deputy Stage Manager

Ruthie Philip-Smith

Assistant Stage Managers

Olly Holmes, Louise Pearson

The production transferred to Alexandra Palace Theatre, London, from 26 November 2021, produced by Eleanor Lloyd Productions and Eilene Davidson Productions, with the following changes to the cast and creative team:

GRACE CRATCHIT

Eilah Jaffar/ Evie Miller/ Jasmine Nyenya

EDWIN CRATCHIT

Kaylenn Aires Fonseca/ Sonny Fowler/ Xavier Wilkins

Company Stage Manager

Michela Brennan

Deputy Stage Manager

Ruthie Philip-Smith

Assistant Stage Managers

Tash Holdaway, Mark Smith

Sound No. 1

Martin Curtis

Sound No. 2

Emily Coley

Wardrobe Manager

Lisa Brindley

Wardrobe Deputy

Characters

JACOB MARLEY

TINY TIM

BOB CRATCHIT

KEEPER 1

EBENEZER SCROOGE

KEEPER 2

NARRATOR

HELMSMAN

FRED

SEAMAN

MISS DIMPLE

CAROLINE

MRS BOONE

TOPPER

A BLIND MAN

POLL

TOM

MISS CHOKEPEAR

BONNIFACE

MR CHOKEPEAR

GHOST OF CHRISTMAS PAST

MR GRUB MISS GRUB

YOUNG SCROOGE

IGNORANCE

FAN

WANT

MR THRUMPHULL POSTBOY

GHOST OF CHRISTMAS YET TO COME

FEZZIWIG

PLUMCHUTE

YOUNG MARLEY

GIPP

MRS FEZZIWIG

TOTTERALL

MR BOUNCER

OLD JOE

BELLE

MRS DILBER

FATHER

MR THURSDAY

CHILD

MRS CHITTY

GHOST OF CHRISTMAS PRESENT

MR BOSWICK MRS BOSWICK

WAITER

BOY

SECOND WAITER

PARLOUR MAID

MRS CRATCHIT

ELDERLY WOMAN

BELINDA CRATCHIT

PETER CRATCHIT

EDWIN CRATCHIT

GRACE CRATCHIT

MARTHA CRATCHIT

And a SKINNY BOY, BOYS THROWING SNOWBALLS, A WRETCHED WOMAN and baby, PHANTOMS, a GHOST IN A WHITE WAISTCOAT, SCHOOLBOYS, a FIDDLER, MRS FEZZIWIG’s DAUGHTERS, WORKMEN, BELLE’s CHILDREN, a MINER, PARTY GUESTS, BOSWICK CHILDREN

This ebook was created before the end of rehearsals and so may differ slightly from the play as performed.

ACT ONE

Scene One

Darkness. Darkness that gradually opens out to reveal a low, gloomy, coffin-black counting house, its corners softened into shadow. Every shelf crammed with mouldering papers, files and ledgers – like bad teeth in a rotten mouth.

And there, perched on a high stool at a high desk, is a withered man. His spectacles are on his forehead and he’s burning a stick of wax over a candle-flame.

The candle’s almost spent.

He seals the wax with his signet ring and looks up.

MARLEY. Cratchit!

There’s a a scrambling from the outer office and BOB CRATCHIT tumbles in. He’s scrawny and fairly blue with cold.

BOB. Yes, sir?

MARLEY. Correspondence. The matter of Unwin, Chatterham and Penge. You’ll just make the last post.

He tosses the sealed letter and a pile of others at his clerk.

BOB. Begging your pardon, sir. But, you’re forgetting…

MARLEY. I am?

BOB. Last post’s gone, sir. Early. On account of the season.

MARLEY. Season?

BOB. Christmas, sir!

MARLEY narrows his eyes, opens his mouth to respond when, from somewhere in the office, as though a phantom has spoken, comes the cry:

SCROOGE. Humbug!!

The withered man – JACOB MARLEY – smiles, a horrible, basilisk smile.

MARLEY. As my esteemed partner would have it, Cratchit. Humbug!

BOB. Yes, Mr Marley. Humbug, sir. I’m sure, sir. Yes, sir.

Lights up on the adjacent office which abuts MARLEY’s. It’s almost a duplicate. At his high desk, his face buried in ledgers is EBENEZER SCROOGE.

SCROOGE. You’ll deliver those letters by hand, Cratchit.

BOB. All of them, Mr Scrooge?

SCROOGE. Every. Single. One.

BOB. But it’s almost seven, sir. And Christmas Eve…

SCROOGE looks up, quill poised. He’s crabbed, gimlet-eyed, a mouth like a dog’s arse.

SCROOGE (contemptuously). Christmas Eve. And you’ll want the whole day off tomorrow?

BOB. If… quite convenient, sir.

SCROOGE. It’s not convenient. And it’s not fair. If we were to stop you half a crown for it, you’d think yourself ill-used, I’ll be bound!

BOB. It is only once a year, sir.

SCROOGE. A poor excuse for picking a man’s pocket every twenty-fifth of December. Eh, Jacob?

MARLEY. Well put, Ebeneezer. Christmas! Hum–

SCROOGE. –bug!

SCROOGE fixes BOB with an unwavering stare.

You’ll despatch every last one of those letters, Cratchit. And only then may you get yourself home for your… celebrations.

BOB. Yes, sir.

In a flurry, BOB scrambles into his long scarf and claps his battered hat onto his head.

Goodnight, Mr Scrooge. Mr Marley. A merry –

SCROOGE and MARLEY look up simultaneously. The words die on BOB’s lips and he hurries out.

There’s a blast offreezing air and snow flakes from the door.

MARLEY. A merry Christmas!

SCROOGE. And him a clerk on fifteen shillings a week! We have only ourselves to blame, Jacob. Out of misguided altruism we employ wretches such as Cratchit – yet do they attempt to rise above their miserable station? Do they grasp their opportunities as we did? Nay! What that lazy fellow needs is his wits sharpening. What do you say? A reduction in salary? Thirteen shillings a week?

MARLEY. Twelve?

SCROOGE. Eleven?

MARLEY. Ten?

SCROOGE. Ten! A nice round figure, eh, Jacob?

They both chuckle mirthlessly. Then MARLEY gives a little gasp of pain. He clutches his arm, then his chest. His quill flutters to the floor. In the other office, SCROOGE is oblivious.

Do you want to break the happy news, Jacob, or shall I?

Jacob?

No response.

Jacob?

No response.

He gets up and shuffles into MARLEY’s office.

MARLEY lies stretched across his desk.

Dead as a coffin nail.

SCROOGE feels for a pulse. Gives a grunt. Not a flicker of emotion passes over his face.

He snuffs out the little candle by the side of the desk.

SCROOGE. Waste not, want not.

Scene Two

A wintry wind howls over the scene. And over the sign hanging outside the offices. ‘SCROOGE and MARLEY’, gold on ebony. It’s enveloped in freezing fog and begins to age. The wood cracks, the letters fade.

NARRATOR (voice-over). Marley was dead. To begin with. This must be distinctly understood or nothing wonderful can come of the story I am going to tell you.

Lights up on an elderly man – our NARRATOR. He’s sitting in a leather armchair, wearing an Edwardian smoking jacket and slippers.