A Christmas Carol [Monterey SoundWorks Version] (Dramatized)

I’ll admit, I was skeptical about a 111-minute abridgment of *A Christmas Carol*—Dickens’ meandering prose is half the fun, right? But this production proves less can be more when the editing is this surgical. The St. Charles Players nail the eerie atmospherics, especially during the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come segment, where the absence of dialogue and the oppressive silence between Scrooge’s panted breaths make the final reveal land like a body dropped into an open grave. The narration is crisp and full of character—Scrooge’s gruff miserliness crackles through every syllable, while the Ghost of Christmas Past sounds like a child’s voice coming from inside your own skull. My only gripe? The Ghost of Christmas Present’s feast scene feels tonally jarring, like a sitcom laugh track interrupting a horror movie. And the abrupt fade-out after Scrooge’s redemption, while thematically fitting, leaves you craving the kind of soot-and-candle detail Dickens lavishes on the Cratchit household. Still, as a holiday tradition that won’t eat up your evening, this is a ghost story for the impatient and the easily spooked.