My co-reviewer Jhasper and I rocked up to the last dress rehearsal. I was expecting something a bit fusty, a bit Victorian. Jhasper being 13 had no expectations, just excitement.
So when the stage appeared to be unadorned except for a solitary door, standing all by itself at around about centre stage, I was bemused.
Then it got dark, and a haunting voice told us where the fire exits were...
I realised we weren’t going to get fusty, or Victorian.
We were about to get something a little different.
The solitary door was joined by multiple modules of black-painted set that moved, morphed and remodelled themselves into various configurations ... changing from Scrooge’s counting house to his bedroom, to Bob Cratchit’s home and a Victorian streetscape.
The actors are in grim black as well, adorned with just a few items of colour and form that identify them as their characters: Cratchet, the deceased Marley, a ghost or two...
The Victorian aspect was there in dialect and the items of costuming, but the set is modern and moving, allowing the play to be acted on various levels, allowing Scrooge the onlooker to peer down on scenes of Christmases past and present and yet to come.
The casting is fabulous. Edward Charleton-Holmes is the archetypal Scrooge, crusty and sour and grumpy and unpleasant.
From his fleecing of the bewildered and downtrodden Mrs Lack (Hilary Blamires) to his utterings of bah humbug - he’s a thoroughly believable nasty piece of work.
Charleton-Holmes is on stage almost constantly, with a staggering amount of dialogue. A demanding role that he throws himself into with relish.
Others gracing the stage have their own challenges - four actors with quick costume changes covering 25 different roles, from ghosts to nephews, children, housemaids and horrible headmasters.
The four include familiar face Helen Griffin, whose ghost of Christmas Present is an utter joy, Kate Taylor flipping roles of wives, mothers and spooky spirits with consummate ease, newcomer Chris Scanlan - another spectacular spook as well as outstanding in his multiple roles, and the talented Oisin Casey Galloway, bringing lessons learned from London’s Globe Theatre to the Waipukurau Little Theatre stage.
They skilfully navigate an ever-moving set and props, swiftly propelled and presented by five deft stage hands who also appear as singers and dancers ...260 moves of set pieces and props throughout the play.
This play is clever. The set is a wonder, the casting is inspired, and the agility of the actors with their differing parts - changing aspects of age, voice, body language - is pretty darned seamless.
It’s a grim play - black set, crusty Scrooge, many spooks - but hilarious and thoroughly entertaining. The sound and lighting - Rob Blamires, Charlie Mavin, Juliette Griffin - are both crucial to the atmosphere of this play and each needs to take its own bow.
Super entertaining. Jhasper, at 13, was enthralled, managing to tear himself away to jot just a couple of notes on his revewer’s notepad: “It is very funny”, and “I like it a lot.”
He particularly liked Marley’s ghost, who gave him jump scares.
I liked the whole darned thing.
Director Lindsay Bishop’s vision and over a year of hard work has paid off in spades, there’s nothing Bah Humbug about this thoroughly entertaining production. “Fank you, fank you fank you sir!”
