A CHRISTMAS CAROL at the Old Vic - Rhys Ifan's Ghost Dance

Yes it's that time of the year when Owen seeks out a new adaptation of Charles Dickens' A CHRISTMAS CAROL - more often than not to be able to say "They don't do *that* in the book".  This year it was to the Old Vic we ventured to see how Ebenezer Scrooge saw the light on Christmas Eve night and became a better man for it...

 

The Old Vic has been radically changed with a transom stage that dissects the auditorium in two - and audience seating on the stage too - for a production that brings the audience right into the centre of the Jack Thorne's version of the story though it wasn't used to it's fullest extent, most of the action still took place in the centre of the stage crossroads - the transom just made for some room for dancing and, at it's best, for Jacob Marley's lengthy train of chains and cashboxes.

For all the production's explosion of theatricality - more of that later - Thorne's adaptation felt thin and uninvolved, maybe I am over-familiar with the story but it felt like they were playing the synopsis and not the script.  Maybe it was Thorne's take on Dickens tale; Thorne has invented the character of Scrooge's father who is emotionally distant and uncaring - ah so that's it - Scrooge isn't nasty he just never had enough love in his childhood - and to quote Roxie Hart in CHICAGO - "and that's show biz, kids".  I think I prefer my Scrooge to just be a bastard.

None of the ghostly apparitions changed the tempo either - maybe because they were all played by similar-looking women - and the Ghost of Christmas Future was profoundly unscary, what is the point of that??  Scrooge really didn't have far to jump from being just narked to embracing life.

It felt like director Matthew Warchus couldn't wait to get to the scene where Scrooge wakes up a changed man on Christmas morning and the preparations for the biggest Xmas feat ever take over the whole of the auditorium while the audience experiences the wonder of a white Christmas.  But is Scrooge just dreaming?

I loved the theatricality of it all - the ensemble handing out free mince pies and oranges before the show started, the bell-ringing for lovely hushed versions of Christmas carols, the snow blizzards, the It's A Knockout feel to the Xmas dinner preparations but it all felt a bit added on; none of it seemed to rise from Thorne's text.

Rhys Ifans is good as Scrooge looking like a wizened husk of a man who blooms into an excitable beanstalk at the joy of life, he has great charisma on stage and it has just been announced that he will make a third Old Vic appearance in 2018 in a new play about the music business.

There was fine contributions from John Dagleish as Bob Cratchett, Alex Gaumond as Bob Marley and Golda Rosheuvel as the Ghost of Christmas Present.  I also liked Erin Doherty as Belle who has an invented scene at the close of the play where Scrooge visits her to apologize for his behaviour as a young man and she replies in a very non-Dickensian way that without him in her earlier life she would not be happily married and able to forgive him all these years later.

Warchus directs with a steady hand but the show does belong to designer Rob Howell and lighting designer Hugh Vanstone who create a very unique theatrical experience.  The music adds greatly to the feel of the show and Christopher Nightingale deserves plaudits for his composing and arranging of carols.

I would recommend A CHRISTMAS CAROL for it's exuberant festive finale and nice performances but do we really need a psychologically-profiled Scrooge?  I don't think so.

They Weren't Like Everybody Else

Constant Reader, you will know that I'm not the biggest fan of jukebox musicals.  Along with the 'film-to-stage' show that have proliferated of late, the jukebox musical is the woeful sign of a race to the bottom mentality in theatre.  However, when Hampstead Theatre announced they were staging a musical based on the rise of The Kinks using their marvelous back catalogue with the blessing of Ray Davies, well it was a no-brainer.  I wasn't the only one either as the show is now sold out for it's run.  Although there are some dodgy moments, the show - and the music - is ultimately triumphant.

All the usual elements are there in Joe Penhall's book: the humble beginnings, the sudden rise to fame, the inter-group rivalries that are thrown into sharp relief by the availability of drink and drugs and the inevitable nervous breakdown.  Sadly - and although the real salient point of The Kinks' story is the shifting relationship of the brothers Ray and Dave Davies - Penhall's script settles for the sketchiest of details and told in clichéd lines that almost made me wonder whether he was deliberately attempting a strip-cartoon version of their story.

 

Luckily, the show also has Ray Davies' songs to flesh out the story.  Ray Davies' songs always have been mini-chapters from an ongoing story and here they help move the story forward as well as being joyful celebrations of this most idiosyncratic of groups.  Where Penhall does do well is sorting out the labyrinthine union politics that saw The Kinks being banned from playing in America for four years in the latter part of the 1960s.

Edward Hall directs the show at a galloping space which helps to cover the thinness of the book and wraps the action around the stalls auditorium, making full use of Miriam Buether's large stage and runway which stretches out into the middle of the stalls - and guess who was sat at the end of it?  It was actually great fun to have the cast whizzing around past you - oh and I got pulled up out of my seat to join with the dancing to Britain's favourite song about a nightclub tranny "Lola"!

The busy cast all contribute to the show's success and the four lead players deserve all the kudos they will receive.  Ned Derrington and Adam Sopp both had their moments to shine as bassist Pete Quaife and drummer Mick Avory, part of the group but always in the shadows of the fractious brothers.  John Dagleish had one hell of a job taking on the role of Ray Davies and while he gave a sympathetic performance, he never totally convinced probably due to the fact that he looked more like Paul McCartney than our Ray!

Much more successful was George Maguire as the volatile Dave Davies, he was devilishly charismatic and to quote Lady Caroline Lamb's summation of Lord Byron "mad, bad and dangerous to know"!  There were also nice supporting performances from Tam Williams and Dominic Tighe as the group's upper-class managers, Vince Leigh and Ben Caplan as their other managers and Philip Bird as the flashy Allan Klein.  Lillie Flynn as Ray's wife Rasa wrestled with a rather thankless role.

The show concludes with the creation of Ray's masterpiece "Waterloo Sunset" - and yes, Constant Reader, that song worked it's magic on me once again.  Terry and Julie crossed over the river again and I was in tearful paradise.

We flash-forward to 1970 and the magnificent "Lola", and by the time the cast had left the stage, I had a huge grin on my face and wanting this great production to transfer to the West End where it and it's wonderful score can be given a wider audience.  In a perfect world, it would be in repertory with Ray Davies' haunting musical COME DANCING from 2008 which was his take on another moment from his past.

I hope he enjoyed the opening night at Hampstead...