BWW Reviews: CATCO Reinvents Holiday Classic in A CHRISTMAS CAROL

In an imaginative retelling of "A Christmas Carol," CATCO breathes new life into Charles Dickens' beloved holiday story and presents a creative reinterpretation of this classic yuletide tale.

Based on the 1843 novel of the same name, "A Christmas Carol" has been adapted for a myriad of screen and stage performances since the early 1900s.

Written by Tony-award-winning playwright Patrick Barlow ("The 39 Steps"), "A Christmas Carol" returns to the Vern Riffe Center's Studio One Theatre for a second year, with performances running through Dec. 21.

Like the adaptations that have preceded it, CATCO's performance, directed by Joe Bishara, includes a memorable cast of characters--from the Ghosts of Christmas Past (Beth Conley), Present (Dani Mann) and Future (Jeff Horst) to Ebenezer Scrooge (Ken Erney) and Bob Cratchit (Ben Sostrom) and his son, Tiny Tim (Andrew Protopapas)--and shares with audiences a classic tale of redemption and the magic of Christmas spirit.

Where this rendition bravely ventures off the beaten path, though, is in the complexity of the storyline and the versatility of the cast--made up of just seven actors, many of whom play three or more characters throughout the two-hour production.

At the beginning of the show, the audience is transported, quite jarringly, to an abandoned theater in 1940s England. Air raid sirens wail in the distance while earth-shaking explosions cause a group of friends to duck and search for cover mid-sentence.

To pass the time until the bomb raid ends, the friends gather around a pile of dusty scripts and decide to put on a play. The show they determine to haphazardly produce is--you guessed it--"A Christmas Carol."

The friends shed their tweed garments and don costumes straight out of 19th century England. They light the stage with a warm glow of candles dripping wax from the rafters, unfurl dusty backdrops and wheel wooden props into position. Two of the friends (Annie Huckaba and Protopapas) step in as a temporary soundtrack, singing a cappella Christmas carols between scenes.

The play is presented in two parts, with a 15-minute intermission separating the acts.

For the most part, Dickens' classic story, on which this version is centered, remains untouched, and except for small idiosyncrasies that contribute to the "play within a play" theme of this retelling, the story of Scrooge's journey of self-discovery and moral redemption is traditionally presented.

The creativity in regards to the presentation of the more supernatural aspects of this play is intriguing, and carefully crafted to remain plausible within the framed story structure.

Flying over the rooftops of England with the Ghost of Christmas Present was made possible by a swirling spotlight behind the actors on stage. In the absence of children--who obviously could not just randomly appear in the abandoned theater during a bomb raid--a repurposed 1930s marionette is used to play the parts of Tiny Tim and Young Scrooge.

Fully comprehending the framed story structure took quite a bit of adjustment because the extent of the overlap between the play's two time periods was not ever made entirely clear. One would be invested in Scrooge's bleak world in Victorian England when another character, dressed in period clothes, would appear from the wings with a script in hand, reading stiffly from the page's printed dialogue.

The fact that, in this version, actors are responsible for portraying a variety of characters added to the confusion toward the beginning of the play, when audience members hadn't quite grasped the "play within a play" relationship that strung the reinvented narrative together.

By the end of the first act, however, the relationship between characters was much clearer, and the specific details of the framed story structure were better understood. Nevertheless, a quick paragraph or description of the play's dual settings and the roles each actor portrays in both 1940s and Victorian England--perhaps included somewhere in the program--would have further clarified this aspect.

Overall, CATCO's "A Christmas Carol" presented a classic holiday tale in a fun, innovative manner, but also took care to preserve the traditions rooted in this classic story and maintain the integrity of the play's message.

There is no doubt that "A Christmas Carol" will forever be cemented as a holiday staple, but often too-stringent adherence to tradition leads to little variance in interpretation. CATCO's reimagined version is a breath of fresh air--a thoughtful twist on a classic sure to speak to audiences of all ages.

Tickets are available for purchase via Ticketmaster.com. They may also be purchased by calling (614) 469-0939, visiting the CAPA box office (39 E. State St.) or calling or visiting any Central Ohio Ticketmaster location.

The Vern Riffe Center is located at 77 S. High St.

Photo Credit: Dave Alkire

Video Credit: CATCO