Travis Michael Holder – TicketHoldersLA For me, the best part of Charles Dickens’ classic 1843 novella is that it conjures a time of year when dead people apparate to terrorize rich people in the middle of the night until they agree to pay their employees better. Now, that’s a fable for 2024 if there ever … Read more
Don Shirley – Angeles Stage Sondheim was dead, to begin with. There is no doubt whatever about that. Old Sondheim was as dead as a doornail. Yes, those words were inspired by the opening lines of “A Christmas Carol,” but no, I’m not suggesting that Stephen Sondheim was like Scrooge’s ex-partner Jacob Marley — other than the fact that … Read more
Jonas Schwartz-Owen – Theatermania The holiday season has come to the Ahmanson Theatre, where London’s Old Vic Theatre has installed its annual A Christmas Carol, with Bradley Whitford playing Scrooge. While Jack Thorne’s new adaptation does attempt to add dimension to the Scrooge character, painting childhood abuse and a misguided desperation for money as a motivation … Read more
Erin Conley – On Stage & Screen Around this time of year, productions of the Charles Dickens classic A Christmas Carol are a dime a dozen, but none is quite like the moody, spooky version currently running at the Geffen Playhouse in Los Angeles.Read more… Now running through December 16
Jonas Schwartz – TheaterMania A Christmas Carol is perfect fare for the holidays. It captures the importance of giving, sharing with loved ones, and reevaluating past choices. A Noise Within‘s co-producing artistic director Geoff Elliott has created his own adaptation, which has been performed at the theater for the last six years.Read more…
David C. Nichols – LA Times Christmas Carol” is upon us, and its winning A Noise Within production is a keeper. Amid worthy area stagings of Charles Dickens’ immortal classic about miserly Ebenezer Scrooge’s Christmas Eve journey to redemption, this deftly performed, meta-theatrical edition stands out for fidelity to text, witty stagecraft and heartfelt embrace … Read more
Deborah Klugman – LA Weekly What made Ebenezer Scrooge such a miserable old coot? Adapter-director Christina Harris elaborates on this aspect of Dickens’ cautionary tale in Sierra Madre Playhouse’s amiable musical production of A Christmas Carol, embellished with songs and upbeat ensemble dancing. Scott Harris portrays the tight-fisted miser as less an icy capitalist than … Read more