Christmas Carol: A Fairy Tale (NHB Modern Plays)

Things are going to be different. Very different... 1838, London. Jacob Marley is dead. And so is Ebenezer Scrooge... In this reinvention of the timeless classic, Ebenezer has died and his sister Fan has inherited his money-lending business. She rapidly becomes notorious as the most monstrous miser ever known, a legendary misanthrope, lonely, and despised by all who cross her path. This year, on Christmas Eve, Fan Scrooge will be haunted by three spirits. They want her to change. But will she? This stage adaptation of Charles Dickens's Christmas tale is by renowned author Piers Torday. Christmas Carol: A Fairy Tale first came to life in the Dickensian environment of the world's oldest-surviving music hall, Wilton's Music Hall, London, in December 2019. It will prove a festive gift for amateur theatre companies seeking an original, female-led version with lashings of goodwill to all men - and women.

Charles Dickens (1812-1870) was an English writer and social critic who is generally regarded as the greatest novelist of the Victorian period. His major works include: The Pickwick Papers (1836), Oliver Twist (1837-9), Nicholas Nickleby (1838-9), A Christmas Carol (1843), Martin Chuzzlewit (1843-4), David Copperfield (1849-50), Bleak House (1852-3), Hard Times (1854), Little Dorrit (1855-7), A Tale of Two Cities (1859), Great Expectations (1860-1), Our Mutual Friend (1864-5) and the unfinished The Mystery of Edwin Drood (1870), as well as other novels, books and short stories. None of his major works has ever gone out of print.