| Jefferson Mays is odd. He has always seemed out of time, not quite wherever he is. And he’s often floridly manic. In A CHRISTMAS CAROL these unique qualities mostly work to his advantage. He’s basically reading the Dickens classic to us, except he isn’t; he’s playing it, accompanied by a crucially good stage and sound design, full throttle. This can seem too frantic at times—and too loud—but, by and large, Mays is wonderful here, a perfect match of personality and character(s). It helps that he avoids what is so often cloying about presentations of this story and sticks to its strangeness. And its shadows. Scrooge is not just a comically miserable fussbudget, he’s disconsolate. Mays manages to capture his moods more entirely than many and so this CHRISTMAS CAROL isn’t exactly delightful. The light comes, but the tunnel is, as it should be, long. |
