Simm’s performance is filled to the brim with humanity
Woody was scooped from school, bundled into his winter parka, thrust through underground passages and jostled onto tube trains. Within minutes we were hurtling along a freezing Waterloo Road to the welcoming lights of the Old Vic to enjoy A Christmas Carol, writes Ed and Woody Gray.
Much of the light we are about to bathe in owes its warmth to writer Jack Thorne who has taken on the task of adapting Charles Dickens’ classic tale of miserly misanthrope Ebenezer Scrooge’s hauntings, premonitions, redemption and reformation. Playwright, television and screen writer Thorne is the right man for the job with so many glowing productions and five BAFTAs lighting his path.
It gets better. ‘It’s the Master!’ declares Woody triumphantly as he peruses the programme. He’s referring to John Simm of course, who also happens to play The Master in Dr Who. We take our seats to some fine reels and jigs performed by top-hatted Victorian gents. Mince Pies and tangerines are handed out to the excited crowd as the house lights go down.
The minimal set in the round, consisting of used doorframes and chests, is quickly brought to life with dramatic lighting. The cast mime bolting and unbolting the locks that trap the emotional trauma locked away deep in Scrooge’s psyche as he lives his life ‘as solitary as an oyster’.
Thorne includes much of Dickens’ wonderfully incisive wordplay, perfectly crafted to tickle the ribs and prick the conscience as he prises open this great literary creation. We revel in Ebenezer’s back-story, his debtor father’s cruelty towards him, his failed relationship with Belle and his love for deceased sister Fan. The bones of the man are fleshed out in the production to ultimately reveal a warm, beating heart.
Melodrama is drained and Simm’s performance is filled to the brim with humanity as Scrooge is forced to confront his midlife crisis. After his visitations Ebenezer’s subsequent epiphany brings a tear to the eye as he hugs his troubled younger self atop his own coffin.
Director Matthew Warchus’ Scrooge brings to mind Simm’s namesake Alistair Sim’s tenderly jovial Scrooge from the 1951 film version. But this is so much more than a reheated Victorian leftover. There’s much of the old music hall here as the audience is treated to singing and dancing, and a delightful finale that invites the whole house to share Christmas dinner with sausages, puddings and a giant turkey. Woody is on the edge of his seat, wide-eyed with wonder as the snowflakes fill the theatre.
In a nod to the societal reformation that Dickens desired to inspire by writing A Christmas Carol, the audience is encouraged to donate to the Waterloo Foodbank as we exit the theatre – all aglow, one and all. This request is rightly fitting as we head to the station past people begging in the very cold streets that a restless Dickens himself would have strode on his many night walks through the city.
‘The best play I’ve ever seen!’ says the boy delightedly. ‘At first I didn’t like him, and by the end I wanted him to be my best friend. That’s the sign of a very good story.’ I imagine a ghost of writer striding past us, with a wink and a nod. Scrooge is in rude health and warm, safe hands at the Old Vic.
Old Vic, The Cut, SE1 8NB until January 4th. Admission: £15 – £95.
Booking: www.oldvictheatre.com
