Presents
Book by: Lynn Ahrens and Mike Ockrent
Lyrics by: Lynn Ahrens
Music by: Alan Menken
The story by Charles Dickens
The musical opens at the Royal Exchange with the “London Town Carol” singing of the bells and lamps aglow. Christmas is near and all are awaiting the early close of the Exchange so the holiday can officially start. Everyone: bankers, people rich and poor are wishing each other “A Jolly Good Time” knowing that they will all have a jolly good time tonight. Mr. Smythe and his daughter, Grace, enter looking for Ebenezer Scrooge hoping for his sympathy by giving them a bit more time to pay him their debt. Scrooge enters with his clerk Bob Cratchit who Scrooge is sure will want to take advantage of him by taking Christmas day off. Mr. Smythe approaches Scrooge to ask for more time to pay since he needs money for his wife’s funeral. Scrooge replies to Grace, “You’ll learn soon enough, child, that Christmas is a HUMBUG!”
When asked for charity for the poor, Scrooge replies,”…Are there no prisons? Are there no workhouses?” Scrooge believes that charity has “Nothing To Do With Me.”
Cratchit tells him about his sickly youngest son, Tiny Tim, but Scrooge pays little mind to him as he complains about being taken advantage of.
On the streets of London we meet some of the denizens of the city. There is the sandwich board man, a blind old hag, and a lamplighter among them (all of whom we will meet again when Scrooge starts his nocturnal trip through Christmas past, present, and future). We travel to Cratchit’s humble home and Bob and Tim are off to buy the makings of their Christmas feast. Bob tells Tim that “You Mean More To Me” than anything. Meanwhile Scrooge meets his nephew Fred who invites him for Christmas dinner. Scrooge has never dealt with the death of his sister giving birth to Fred and hasn’t yet met Fred’s wife, Sally. Fred assures his uncle he wants nothing from him but Scrooge sends him on his way.
Scrooge meets the sandwich board man and the lamplighter who warn him it is later than he thinks and he will be sorry when he looks back. When he refuses to give the blind old hag alms she tells him that there are none so blind as those who will not see.
When he arrives at his home he sees the face of his deceased partner, Jacob Marley. Later in his parlor, the ghost of Marley confronts him bound in chains that he, himself, forged “Link By Link” during the course of his life. Marley tells Scrooge to “unlock your heart. It’s not too late! Or you’ll be dragging something more than twice this weight.” Marley tells Scrooge that he will be visited by three ghosts. At one it will be the ghost of Christmas past, at two the ghost of Christmas present, and at three the ghost of Christmas yet to be. “Three ghosts who yet may stop you ending up like me…” Marley leaves after a chorus of ghosts tells Scrooge he is forging his chain link by link.
Scrooge, in his bedroom, is visited by the Ghost of Christmas Past (who looks remarkably like the lamplighter). The ghost sings of “The Lights of Long Ago” and shows Scrooge scenes from his past: his father being taken to jail for non-payment of debts and the separation from his mother and his beloved sister, Fan. His father’s last words are to save his pennies and make his fortune and save it. Next we see Scrooge at twelve saving every cent he earns. The young boy writes to Fan and dreams of “A Place Called Home” but Fan will die giving birth to Fred. Next we see another scene from the past where Scrooge sees how loving people can be at “Mr. Fezziwig’s Annual Christmas Ball”. Scrooge realizes that an employer can make his workers happy and while the festivities continue the young Ebenezer proposes to Emily singing “A Place Called Home”.
Scroooge starts his partnership with Marley and they begin to forge the chain that will bind them so many years later. They turn on Fezziwig and demand he repay his monetary debt to them and later Emily, neglected and loved second to his gold, breaks off her engagement with Ebenezer.
Left desolate and alone by the vanquished ghost, Scrooge is visited by the Ghost of Christmas Present who resembles the sandwich board man. The ghost sings to Scrooge, “the present’s full of pleasures! Things to see enjoy and taste! And at Christmas, no one measures, his wallet or his waist!” And while singing of abundance, charity, and good will, the ghost whisks Scrooge off to Bob Cratchet’s house where the family all sing of “Christmas Together.” It is only now that Scrooge sees that Tiny Tim is ill even though Bob had told him earlier. A visit to Fred’s house is next where his not present Uncle is toasted and finally all of London sings a song celebrating that love, friendship, and family are together at Christmas, “together. All over, The earth”. The spirit shows Scrooge how fragile Tim is and then shows Scrooge two children in a desperate state in great need: they are ignorance and want, and that ignorance will be mankind’s doom. When asked if Tiny Tim will live, Scrooge is told that if the shadows remain unaltered by the future, the child will die.
As Scrooge desperately asks what he can do to change the future he is whisked to St. Paul’s graveyard where gravediggers are digging a grave and male monks sing of people never saved who will be dancing on Scrooge’s grave. Scrooge says to the last ghost “Tear me into shreds and re-create me! Tell me that it’s not too late to learn!”
Scrooge then sees a corpse unceremoniously dumped from its bed while the undertakers strip the body of its clothes and bedclothes singing that he “wasn’t worth your spit while he was still around. But just look how much he’s worth now that he’s dead.” At the graveyard again, Scrooge sees the Cratchit family grieving over the grave of Tiny Tim and seeing his own name on a gravestone, Scrooge begins to understand (“Yesterday, Tomorrow and Today”). He tells the spirit, “I can see a future full of beauty, And my spirit starts to fly! I can change the world, yes, it’s my duty! God forgive me! Let me try!”
It is now Christmas morning and Scrooge is chastened by his night’s adventures. He give a young boy money to buy a prize turkey and deliver it to the Cratchet’s house and in a reprise of “Nothing To Do With Me”, Scrooge gives charity, forgives Smythe his debt, and, followed by the town’s children, goes out into the audience giving out candies and Christmas crackers to the children in the audience.
Scrooge gives the prize turkey to the Cratchet’s and promises to raise Bob’s salary and endeavor to help his struggling family from now on. Carrying Tiny Tim on his shoulders, Scrooge goes to his nephew’s house hoping to be allowed to come to dinner while Fred and Sally sing, “Welcome home, Uncle Scrooge, Welcome home to family.”
It starts to snow and everyone sings a reprise of “Christmas Together” while all join hands as Tiny Tim says, “And God bless us, every one!” The musical ends with the song, “God Bless Us Every One,” as everyone waits “ ‘Til each child is fed, ‘Til all men are free, ‘Til the world becomes a family…And God bless us every one.”
Ebenezer Scrooge has learned to live with the spirit of Christmas all the year long and with that spirit, the world will be a better place.
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