From our 2012 production of A Christmas Carol
Guest post from A Christmas Carol director Micky York
This is my seventh Metropolis Christmas Carol. And even though each one has been different (If I were the type to use obvious holiday cliches, I might have compared each production to a snowflake. Luckily, I’m not like that.), it’s hard to not say, “This is how we did it last year” or “Once, we did it this way.” That’s just the way it is with a show that has become such an annual tradition.
For the last two years, we’ve worked with a new adaptation by resident playwright, Scott Woldman. I was heavily involved with the development of the script, as composer and music director, for those first two new productions. During those years, we on the production team were really able to experiment and try out new things and see what worked—and what didn’t. Scenes or bits of staging were reworked. Songs that were in the first production didn’t make it in the following year. (Actually, there are a few new songs this year too, but that’s just because no one is around to tell me not to do it.) The luxury of having Woldman around is that we can say “Hey, I’d like to add this bit of action or change around this bit of dialogue…can you make that happen?” and he’ll make a random idea fit into the framework of the story.
With any production, a director attempts to bring in something new, to put their own spin on things. And—don’t worry—I’m definitely doing that. But we also know the importance of tradition in a story like A Christmas Carol. So we’ve gone back to the original text and added some great new moments to the script. The moment Scrooge realizes it’s Christmas morning is a big one, and I hope those audience members who love that scene will be pleased to see it again.
And speaking of tradition, I’m still trying to figure out how I can bring these chickens back from 2009. Stay tuned.
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