Nothing says Yuletide like a hot, steaming mug of “Bah, humbug,” and Austin theatre companies are dishing up plenty of it this season. At least three different productions of A Christmas Carol are opening this week, with one of them sure to please the discriminating Dickens-lover in your household. For homegrown traditional Scrooge, try the Austin Playhouse, which is reviving the original adaptation created by local playwright Ellsworth Schave and Playhouse Artistic Director Don Toner when Toner was at the State Theater. It features an original score by Allen Robertson and Tom Parker as London’s biggest skinflint. For new, imported Scrooge, head on over to the State Theater, where Artistic Director Scott Kanoff is treating Austin to its first look at an adaptation by Neil Bartlett that was a hit in Dickens’ homeland a few years ago. Michelle Polgar directs David Stahl as the miser who’s as solitary as an oyster. For fresh and spicy Scrooge, you want the Vortex, where one-man theatre company Rob Nash is premiering his solo take on the tale, which sounds like the all-star film version Hollywood didn’t have the nerve to make back in the day. Nash plays Scrooge naturally, but as Bette Davis might have played Scrooge, and he embodies a host of other cinematic icons in the story’s familiar roles, similarly cast across gender, so it’s Joan Crawford as Jacob Marley and Katharine Hepburn as Bob Cratchit, while Cary Grant is Bob’s missus and Humphrey Bogart is Scrooge’s old flame, Belle. Expect, as his title suggests, A Christmas Carol Roasting on an Open Fire. Oh, a wise guy, eh? Nyuk, nyuk, nyuk!
A Christmas Carol runs Dec. 2-18, Thursday-Saturday, 8pm, at Austin Playhouse at Penn Field, 3601 S. Congress. For information, call 476-0084 or visit www.austinplayhouse.com.
A Christmas Carol runs Dec. 3-18, Wednesday-Friday, 7:30pm, Saturday, 4 & 8pm (no 4pm show Dec. 4), Sunday, 2:30pm, at the State Theater, 719 Congress. For information, visit www.austintheatre.org.
A Christmas Carol Roasting on an Open Fire runs Dec. 3-Jan. 2, Thursday-Sunday, 8pm, at the Vortex, 2307 Manor Rd. For information, call 478-LAVA or visit www.vortexrep.org.
This article appears in December 3 • 2004.