A theater producer-director once told me, \u201cIf you\u2019re going to do \u2018King Lear,\u2019 you must first have a King Lear.\u201d<\/p>\n
So it goes with \u201cHamlet\u201d and other Shakespeare plays dependent on a strong lead actor.<\/p>\n
\u201cA Christmas Carol,\u201d in its stage version, has an iconic Shakespearean lead role, that of Ebenezer Scrooge.<\/p>\n
Civic Theatre of Allentown\u2019s 34th annual production of \u201cA Christmas Carol\u201d has a Scrooge for all seasons in Jarrod Yuskauskas, who played the role in Civic\u2019s 2023 \u201cCarol.\u201d The Dec. 5 opening night Civic performance was seen for this review.<\/p>\n
Yuskauskas finds the humanity in Scrooge, who is not a curmudgeon in \u201cCarol\u201d for at least half, maybe even three-quarters, of the play in the Charles Dickens\u2019 classic novella adapted for the stage by William Sanders and Sharon Glassman.<\/p>\n
The Civic production is directed by William Sanders with Assistant Director Patricia Welle and Associate Director JoAnn Wilchek Basist.<\/p>\n
Yuskauskas invokes Scrooge\u2019s tagline \u201cBah! Humbug!\u201d with the best of them. That the icy retort rejects any offer of Christmas cheer is more than evident in Yuskauskas\u2019s delivery, so much so that you are almost bemused from the start that there should be any inkling of hope in reviving the heart of a geezer.<\/p>\n
Yuskauskas is awakened from his bed to confront The Ghost of Jacob Marley (a startling Thomas McElhinny) and floats on the resentments of his youth to the predicaments of his present to the questionable destination of his future on the wings of the Ghost of Christmas Past (a magnificent JoAnn Wilchek Basist, rising like an Angel), the Ghost of Christmas Present (a perfectly too mirthful Julie Burchfield with a hint of the malevolent) and the Ghost of Christmas Future (an ominous Jonathan Beightol).<\/p>\n
All the while, Yuskauskas keeps it real and believable amidst the superb magical stagecraft of Lighting Designer Will Morris, Sound Designer Randall Utsch, Set Designer Josephine Genuardi, Props Master Jason Daniel Sizemore, Costume Designers Rae Labadie and Rigby Maiatico, and Hair and Wig Design by Kim Danish.<\/p>\n
\u201cTo begin with,\u201d to reference Dickens, what\u2019s in a name? Dickens\u2019 choice of Ebenezer is downright Biblical. In 1 Samuel 7:12, the prophet places a stone after it\u2019s said that God helped Israel defeat the Philistines.<\/p>\n
By definition, \u201cEbenezer is a Hebrew name meaning \u2018stone of help,\u2019 derived from eben (stone) and ezer (help).\u201d Samuel puts the stone in place to mark \u201cthe moment of divine intervention,\u201d representing \u201cGod\u2019s faithfulness and saving power, a reminder to look back on past help.\u201d<\/p>\n
On the precipice of Christmas Eve, the parallels of the redemption song \u201cCarol\u201d are palpable and remarkable.<\/p>\n
In the Civic adaptation, the children, including Martha, Peter, Belinda and Tiny Tim, played with infectious delight by Mira Kneller, Xavier Hetrick, Evelyn Haupt and Caiden Baer, respectively, of Bob Cratchit (a lively Christopher Cocca) and Emily Cratchit (a steadfast Kate Hayes) re-enact a Nativity Scene (including a miraculously dropped, as if from on high, and caught Baby Jesus doll).<\/p>\n
Later, Scrooge praises Turkey Boy (an energetic Colton Shupp), who delivers the turkey to the Cratchit family, as \u201ca remarkable boy.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sanders, Civic Theatre of Allentown Artistic Director, marshals all the forces, elements, themes and the huge and hugely-talented cast of Civic\u2019s \u201cA Christmas Carol\u201d with understanding, insight and inspiration. The classic tale of self-discovery is brought to satisfying new heights.<\/p>\n
The time-traveling, science-fiction story of a parallel universe, originally told in Dickens\u2019 1843 Victorian tale, \u201cChristmas Carol. In Prose. Being a Ghost Story of Christmas,\u201d resonates to this day and, here\u2019s hoping, in next year\u2019s Civic Theatre of Allentown 35th anniversary production.<\/p>\n
\u201cA Christmas Carol,\u201d 7:30 p.m. Dec. 5, 6, 10, 12, 18, 19; 3 p.m. Dec. 7, 14; 2 p.m., 7:30 p.m. Dec. 13, 20, Civic Theatre of Allentown, 527 N. 19th St., Allentown. 610-433-8903, https:\/\/civictheatre.com\/<\/p>\n
PHOTO: BILL BASTAJarrod Yuskauskas (Ebenezer Scrooge), The Ghost of Jacob Marley (Thomas McElhinny), \u201cA Christmas Carol,\u201d Civic Theatre of Allentown.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A theater producer-director once told me, \u201cIf you\u2019re going to do \u2018King Lear,\u2019 you must first have a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":67399,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[153,155,154],"class_list":{"0":"post-67398","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-bethlehem","8":"tag-bethlehem","9":"tag-bethlehem-headlines","10":"tag-bethlehem-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67398","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=67398"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67398\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/67399"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=67398"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=67398"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=67398"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}