Good as Gold

New cast members bring fresh spirit to ‘A Christmas Carol’ at McCarter Theatre.

By: Aleen Crispino

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TIMEOFF/MARK CZAJKOWSKI
David Cromwell gets inside the psyche of the miserly antihero om ‘A Christmas Carol" at McCarter Theatre.


   David Cromwell had to be convinced by director Michael Unger to take on the role of Ebenezer Scrooge in this season’s McCarter Theatre production of A Christmas Carol.
   "Playing Scrooge is something I’ve always wanted to avoid," says the actor. "For an old character actor, you realize it’s inevitable that someone’s going to ask you to play Scrooge.
   "I’m a bit of a bah humbugger," he confesses. "I said to Michael, ‘Please tell me it’s not going to be a gooey, treacly, lollipop production.’"
   The actor, who made his regional theater debut at McCarter in 1968 and returned in 2001 to play in The School for Scandal and Romeo and Juliet, soon found the director shared his desire that the play accurately portray the world that Dickens wrote about.

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David Cromwell plays Ebenezer Scrooge and Danny Hallowell is Tiny Tim in McCarter Theatre’s annual production of ‘A Christmas Carol’, playing Dec. 7-24 in Princeton.


   Michael Unger was assistant director of A Christmas Carol at Madison Square Garden for two years before being asked to direct the play at McCarter in 1998. The McCarter production was then and is now based on David Thompson’s adaptation of Charles Dickens’ story. Then, in 2000, the director was asked to take a new look at the entire production.
   "This was just such a smart version and it gave so much back story and history and it had such a powerful emotional center to it that I couldn’t imagine anyone doing it better," says Mr. Unger.
   He decided to keep Thompson’s script and add more Dickens.
   "One of the things that was important to me was I had worked on two versions of ‘Christmas Carol’ that were fairly chipper, I wouldn’t say saccharine, but very pleasant," he says, "and I don’t think Dickens was writing about a pleasant world.
   "I went back to read about Dickens at the time he wrote this and learned that he had gone to the tin-mining industry of Cornwall in England and observed children being worked to death, 6- and 7-year-old kids working 18-hour days in mine shafts pushing heavy carts of coal through these tiny little tunnels."
   Dickens had originally planned to write a pamphlet that spoke out against child-labor abuses in England, the director said. Instead, in 1842, he wrote A Christmas Carol, hoping that it would have more impact.
   With the help of Mr. Thompson, who attends rehearsals and rewrites scenes when necessary, Mr. Unger incorporated this historical background into the script.
   "The opening scene’s all about children coming home from work on Christmas Eve. There’s no dialogue about that but you see a lot of working-class kids dragging their heavy burdens home with them. Martha Cratchit comes home from work on Christmas Eve," he says.
   Mr. Cromwell became convinced of the authenticity of the McCarter production.
   "It’s very Dickens. It does utilize the darkness that Dickens found in the workhouses and poorhouses," he says. "The Cratchits are on the cusp of that."
   Actor and director also take the audience on an emotional journey with Scrooge, adding telling details in order to make believable his ultimate transformation from villainy to virtue.
   For example, Mr. Unger described the scene, early in the play, when Scrooge meets his nephew Fred’s wife, Lily, played by Grace Hsu, who is "double cast" as young Scrooge’s fiancée, Belle. Mr. Cromwell provides Scrooge with a faint glimmer of recognition, which he shakes off. However, this disturbs him enough to leave him just a little more open to seeing the ghost of Marley later that evening, Mr. Unger says.
   For the director, this detail is one of several used to illustrate a line from Dickens that he restored to the script and has used as a focal point for helping the audience relate to Scrooge’s experience.
   "Marley says, ‘How it is that I appear before you in a shape that you can see I may not tell, for I sat invisible beside you many and many a day,’" Mr. Unger quotes. "To me that says the tools for Scrooge’s redemption lie around him all the time, he just didn’t know how to pick them up and use them."
   In preparing for the part, Mr. Cromwell has come to see Scrooge as a three-dimensional character and now relishes playing the role.
   "I feel frankly great about it. I really love the man. I’ve played a lot of bad guys in my day. The secret is you have to love them," he says.
   He is honored to be offered the role played from 2000-2003 by John Christopher Jones, whom he met while performing in New York theater.
   "Chris Jones is a friend of mine. Those are wonderful shoes, or slippers, to fill. I’m flattered," he says.
   In addition to Mr. Cromwell, several other actors have joined the production this season, including Brad Heberlee as Young Scrooge, Don Mayo as Mr. Fezziwig/Old Joe, Price Waldman as Bob Cratchit and Nick Toren as Scrooge’s nephew Fred.
   This is Mr. Heberlee’s second time playing the role of Young Scrooge. The first time was in combination with the role of nephew Fred at Cleveland’s Great Lakes Theater Festival. Mr. Heberlee, who has been acting since he was in a children’s theater group, is a graduate of Yale Drama School. His character is often on the stage with Mr. Cromwell as the older Scrooge, and he tries to find ways to connect their portrayals.
   "I keep one ear open to him and an eye on him to listen to his voice and behavior, so I can have a few of his nuances and gestures," he says.
   Don Mayo, too, has played in another production of A Christmas Carol. In the early 1990s at Madison Square Garden, he played one of the solicitors and understudied Ben Vereen as the Ghost of Christmas Present. He had several opportunities to play the role, often with only a few hours notice.
   Mr. Mayo says one of the challenges of playing Mr. Fezziwig is the Christmas party scene, requiring him to keep pace with the dancers weaving in and out on the dance floor.
   Though not a dancer by training, Mr. Mayo describes himself as "an actor who moves."
   "I’ve danced in other shows," he says. "You’re asked to do a lot of the things the dancers are doing. I’m in the back so it makes it a lot easier on everyone," he jokes.
   In this production, Scrooge flies, and is rumored to have added some new moves. This was another aspect of the role that piqued Mr. Cromwell’s interest.
   "I have to fly with a harness and a wire," he says. "I’ve never done it. I don’t know what it’s going to feel like."
A Christmas Carol plays at McCarter Theatre, 91 University Place, Princeton, Dec. 7-24. Performances: Dec. 7, 9-10, 15-17, 21-23, 7:30 p.m.; Dec. 11-12, 18-19, 1, 5:30 p.m.; Dec. 23, 3 p.m.; Dec. 24, noon, 4 p.m. Tickets cost $31-$42. For information, call (609) 258-2787. On the Web: www.mccarter.org