Crossroads Theatre Company – A Christmas Carol. December 14, 2019.

Elizabeth Ross Johnson Theater, New Brunswick PAC, New Brunswick, NJ.  Orchestra (Seat G114, $60).

Story.  The plot of the musical follows closely Dickens’s novel.  Ebenezer Scrooge starts off as a selfish and unkind man who hates Christmas, and is transformed after encountering first the ghost of his business partner Marley followed by ghosts of the past, the present, and the future.

Conductor – Mesia Austin; Count Stovall – Scrooge, Kaylie Mariah Batista – Tiny Tim, Dwayne Clark – Christmas Present, Arisa Odaka – Christmas Future & Dancer, Matt Provencal – Jacob Marley & Old Joe, Justin Rappaport – Christmas Past & Dancer.

Full disclosure, I didn’t know the details of the story before I went to this musical, and – sadly – do not know much more after attending this play.  So both my story and my list of cast members may be incomplete.

First a little about the experience.  My understanding is this musical has been around for a while, and often see it advertised during the Christmas season nowadays.  Alan Menken, who wrote the music, was also responsible for several other Broadway shows, including “The Little Shop of Horrors” which we saw many years ago – and enjoyed.

Using “The Little Shop” as a yardstick, this musical didn’t come close.  The most noticeable gap is the lack of tunes that I want to hum along.  While the music was pleasant enough, the numbers just didn’t measure up.  Curiously, the name of the Set Designer was crossed out in the Program.  While the vehemence of which was inexplicable (it was manually done), I wouldn’t want to be associated with the set design either.  Simple sets are to be expected in a local production, but for this show we had the bare minimum: a bed, a hearth, a door, a couple of bank teller windows, a cloth Christmas tree, and a painted backdrop of London (I suppose).  The small orchestra sounded okay, though.

The singing was mixed.  There were some good voices.  The theatre was small (seats 385, I am told), and the singers were mike’d up anyway.  Scrooge had mostly a speaking role, which was good as Stovall has a great speaking voice, but just a so-so singing voice.

We go to State Theatre quite a bit, and never noticed this high rise being built.  NBPAC consists of a couple of theaters and rehearsal space, and opened in September.  It escapes me why such a space is necessary as the State Theatre is literally next door; we shall see how well it fares, and how wrong I am.  There are 207 apartments available for rent, and this area of town is probably quite pleasant to live in, close to restaurants and the Rutgers New Brunswick campus.

 Curtain Call with Scrooge and Tiny Tim in the middle of the lineup.

NBPAC has a pleasant feel to it.  Is the venue really necessary?  It is right next to the State Theatre.

Our grandchildren (and their parents) came along.  The kids had a reasonably good time – helped by the ghosts being not too scary – so the parents and the grandparents had a good time.

Afterwards we had a simple dinner at Master Niu’s on George Street.