A Christmas Carol - The Old Vic

Bit unfair. As other have said - it makes the OV a lot of money, and it’s a joyous production. I genuinely can’t imagine seeing a better production of this story.

My sister who is not a theatre goer went to see this the other night. A friend of hers got tickets and asked her to come along and she remembered me saying just how much I had enjoyed it over multiple years. Now, at 66 and living out of town, she's hardly likely to develop a theatre habit. But I can tell you that I got the most over excited text I can ever remember from her as she left the theatre. She clearly had the most magical night and that must be worth something. She was also very touched by the food bank collection.

I saw it on Wednesday, and he moved me very much with his take: less larger than life Dickensian, more intimately human.

He would come about third equal in my rankings, along with Christopher Eccleston, my rankings being a matter of taste more than anything.

Some spoilers follow. . .

My first equal top 2 remain Rhys Ifans and Owen Teale. Teale was SO fierce and brutal he was pure Dickens caricature at the beginning, and Ifans was similar, but a little less brutal. Both did SUCH a 180 degrees by the end that the transformation felt miraculous, larger than life. Ifans was the most manically mischievously joyous Scrooge after the transformation, which remains my favourite post-transformation Scrooge.

John Simm is marvelous not for being larger than life, but for being EXACTLY like life at the beginning, someone you see every day (who might even be you) who just doesn't give a fig about other people because what's-the-point.

But Simm shows us a human vulnerability, even from the beginning, lurking behind the harsh words and the facade, and it's in the multiple myriad moments of extreme fragility, a sensitivity trapped behind a shield of learned casual cruelty, that he really broke my heart.

When Simm is touched by each the events of the play, you see anxiety, compassion and confusion at war with each other, a dawning realisation that he is a total failure and a yearning to love.

It's really quite astonishing and immensely moving. When he becomes joyous, it's as if tenderness, love and joy (that were always there but caged) have been released.

If his before and after are both less extreme than the extremes that have previously carried me away to sublime dramatic heights storywise (as with Ifans and Teale), I feel that his transformational moments are perhaps the most relatable, most tender and most human of all.

Still 5 stars from me.

Handbells, lanterns and snow, oh my! A Christmas Carol definitely delivered Christmas. Despite the manspreading gentleman beside me and the very tall curly haired and fidgety gentleman in front of me, I couldn’t help but smile.

Not a fan of the “bring on the food” moment (those of you who have seen it will know what I mean), but otherwise really well staged. I fail to understand why two children were wheeled on to carry a jelly.

John Simm was a little too understated as grumpy Scrooge for me. I wanted something a little more scary from him and from the ghosts. I don’t believe it needed to be sanitised for children. Maybe Simm was going for something more “real”. His transformation, however, was very moving.

I’m glad I went to see this (my first time) but will be on the look out for something with more teeth in the future.

The "bring on the food" mo was one of my favourites...Each to their own!