December 8 – 27written by Charles Dickens adapted by Barbara Fielddirected by Sean Daniels

PLAY GUIDE

ABoUt thE A ChrIStmAS CAroL PLAY GUIDE

This play guide is a resource designed to enhance your theatre experience. Its goal is twofold: to nurture the teaching and learning of theatre arts and to encourage essential questions that lead to enduring understandings of the play’s meaning and relevance. Inside you will find:

• A historical background on Charles Dickens, the industrialization of England, and the Victorian Era

• Fun A Christmas Carol facts from the novel to the stage

• Activities to help your students make personal connections to their Actors’ Theatre experience

AFtEr thE PErFormAnCEA Christmas Carol study guides and student matinees and study guides address specific educAtionAl objectives:

• Students will identify the elements of drama in dramatic works.

• Students will analyze how time, place and ideas are reflected in drama/ theatre.

• Students will explain how drama fulfills a variety of purposes.

If you have any questions or suggestions for improvements in our study guides, please feel free to contact Jacob Stoebel, Education Coordinator at (502) 584-1265 or jstoebel@actorstheatre.org

Table of conTenTs3 A Christmas Carol Fact Sheet, The Story, Main Characters

4 Little Charlie Dickens

5 Early British Industrialization

6 Backstage Tour

7 Bridgework

8 Upcoming Opportunities

Actors Theatre educationSteven Rahe, Education DirectorJacob Stoebel, Education CoordinatorJeffrey Mosser, Education FellowSarah Lunnie, Literary/Education AssociateRebecca Davis, Education InternCaitlin Puckett, Education Intern

Study guide compiled by Megan Alexander, Gwen Arbaugh, and JoSelle Vanderhooft.

Graphic design by Jen Dorman.

Yum Brands Inc. is honored to sponsor Actors Theatre of Louisville’s Student Matinee Series for the 2009-2010 season.

The crawford charITaBle foundaTIon supports Actors Theatre of Louisville’s 2009-2010 education programs.

The sTorycharles dickens’ A Christmas Carol tells the tale of ebenezer scrooge, a man who has lost the spirit of the holiday season.

His lack of human kindness prompts a Christmas Eve visit from the ghost of his dead business partner, Jacob Marley, who warns Scrooge to change his ways or suffer his own chain-bound fate for eternity. To aid Scrooge in his journey of redemption, Marley sends three spirits who show Scrooge the mistakes of his past, the opportunity in the present, and the chilling promise of the future. Christmas Day, Scrooge wakes to embrace his second chance at life and to spread the holiday spirit to everyone he meets.

Main characTersn Ebenezer Scroogen Bob Cratchitn Jacob Marleyn Ghost of Christmas Pastn Ghost of Christmas Presentn Ghost of Christmas Futuren Fezziwign Tiny Tim

discussion

Scrooge goes through a huge transformation throughout the course of A Christmas Carol. How does he change along the way? Describe Scrooge at the beginning of the play. Describe Scrooge at the end of the play. Do you see any moments in between that lead him to this transformation?

a chrisTMas carol facT sheeT

DiD yoU KnoW…?n Dickens’ A Christmas Carol was first published on December 19, 1843. Although intended to be a potboiler, the book was even more successful than expected, selling over 6,000 copies in its first week.

n The first Actors Theatre production of A Christmas Carol was in 1976.

n Ray Fry was the first actor to play Scrooge on Actors Theatre’s stage.

n Actors Theatre has produced A Christmas Carol 34 years in a row, making it the second-longest running Carol in the United States.

n Over half a million people have attended a performance of A Christmas Carol here at Actors Theatre.

n There are 28 people in the 2009 A Christmas Carol cast.

n The Cratchit family is based on Dickens’ childhood home life. He lived in poor circumstances in a “two up two down” four-room house which he shared with his parents and five siblings.

n Dickens was involved in charities and social organizations throughout his life. At the time he wrote A Christmas Carol he was very concerned with impoverished children who turned to crime and

delinquency in order to survive.

n Dickens, as well as others, thought that education could provide a better life for these children. The Ragged School movement put these ideas into action. The schools provided free education for children in the inner-city. The movement got its name from the way the children attending the school were dressed. They often wore tattered or ragged clothing.

n After A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens wrote several other Christmas stories, one each year, but none was as successful as the original.

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liTTle charlie DicKensThe fascinating events of charles dickens’ childhood helped to form the great writer of novels whose work we enjoy today.

Charles was born in Portsmouth, England, in 1812. His father, John, was a clerk in the Navy Pay Office, while his mother, Elizabeth Barrow, cared for the children. Charles also had a nanny, Mary Weller, who sparked his budding imagination with scary stories featuring a character named “Captain Murder,” whose adventures left the young boy “lying in bed rigid with terror.”

Charles also loved to read and luckily discovered many cheap editions of great novels like Robinson Crusoe, which increased his appetite for literature. During this fairly free period in his life, Charles developed a talent for composing funny songs and characterizations of the people and places he came across in his wanderings.

Charles’ father was transferred to a London office in 1822. There, the boy struggled with many unpleasant differences in the family’s situation as they found themselves crammed into a very small house in Camden Town. In an effort to help the family with their money trouble, his cousin, James, offered to secure Charles a job in a boot-blacking factory. His parents accepted the offer; two days after Charles’ twelfth birthday, he began the most humiliating experience of his life. After two weeks, his father was thrown in debtors’ prison. Upon the death of his grandmother, however, his father received £450, enough for him to pay his way out of prison. This meant that Charles could finally attend school. The eager young man attended the Wellington House Academy, where intellectual and social doors opened to him for the next three years.

Unfortunately, family finances soon forced Charles back to work, this time as an office boy in a law firm. Again, he found his work boring and so turned his attention to acting and the object of his affection, a banker’s daughter named Maria. As an actor, he used his early gift for impersonation and combined it with written sketches of the odd characters found in Victorian London. Charles also took acting lessons and visited the theatre often to improve his skills.

The day before a very important professional audition, Charles became very sick and never rescheduled his appointment. Around the same time, however, he obtained a card for the Reading Room of the British Museum. Upon later reflection, Dickens called this the “usefullest” time of his life as he spent days advancing his education on his own. Shortly after, both

The Times and True Sun offered Charles reporter positions. Thus, he began his career as a writer.

From his haunting experience in the boot-blacking factory to his childhood imitations and character sketches, everything contributed to create the brilliant writer whose Carol continues to lift our spirits each holiday season.

Activity What do you want to be when you grow up? Why? Do you think your current circumstances, (i.e. the town where you are growing up, your family, your friends, etc.) influence your opinion?

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early briTish inDUsTrializaTioncharles dickens wrote A Christmas Carol during the industrial Revolution, a period marked by a rapid development of industry, that took place in england in the late 18th and early 19th centuries and that relied upon the invention of new and improved machinery.

It began and thrived in Britain for many reasons. British people were hardworking and creative, they had good roads and transportation to transfer products from one place to another, and being on an island, they were far away from the battlefields of mainland Europe. But most importantly, their leaders were dedicated to pursuing ways of improving the county’s financial and social status in the world.

Look at the shirt you are wearing. Where do you think it came from? Before the Industrial Revolution, you would need ten people to spin enough yarn for one weaver to make the fabric for your shirt. In 1769, two new inventions solved the problem: the spinning jenny and the water-powered frame, both of which sped up the process of producing yarn. By 1800, Edmund Cartwright invented the power loom, a machine that could make the weaving process even faster. Within two generations, what had once been done at home by hand became an industry. After 1815, handlooms disappeared entirely and new cloth-making machines replaced them.

The steps in increasing textile production were repeated in other goods as well. Metals like iron and steel were being produced in new ways. Also, the sources of power to produce these items changed. Creative people were hard at work revolutionizing the production of steam, water, and electric power sources to keep the factories functioning.

The new developments encouraged urbanization and by 1850, more than half of the population lived in

cities and worked in industry. Britain was becoming the richest country in the world. However with this great wealth came a widening in the gap between social classes. The rich became richer, and the hardworking poor became poorer. Children as young as five were commonly put to work to help support their families, often in very dangerous factory jobs. London itself held the greatest concentration of wealth in the world, but this only included nine families. The rest of London’s population was not quite as fortunate, forced to work long hard hours for very little pay. At the time that Dickens was writing A Christmas Carol, new laws were just beginning to be passed to protect workers and make factories safer.

The streets of 19th century London were crowded and

compact, dark and dirty. row

houses and busy factories stood

side-by-side.

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shep’s WorlDThe Technical siDe of A ChristmAs CArol: an inTervieW WiTh seT Designer paUl oWen

bacKsTage ToUr

PauLWell, I started out as an actor and director. I then became a designer of sets, lights, and costumes. Once I discovered the theatre, I found that I really like it. I’ve stuck with it and feel it is a very important part of the community.

PI worked with the Alley Theatre in Houston, TX.

QuesTionHave you

always wanted to be a set designer?

QWhere did you

work before you came

here?

QWhat do you

think you would be if

you weren’t a set designer?

QWhat exactly

does a set designer do?

QWhat are the

steps you take to achieve

this?

Qi’ve seen a model

of one of your sets. They are so

detailed. How do you make those

tiny little chairs?

QHow do you keep

the set new and exciting and keep

the audience’s interest each year?

PI have no idea. I can’t imagine doing anything else.

PA set designer creates the environment for plays based on the author’s intent and the director’s interpretation. He or she provides an environment that supports these two elements.

PIt starts with reading the script and finding and solving the problems first. I have to figure out how the play’s environment can fit into our actual space at Actors. The next step is determining the ground plan, or the “map,” for the course of activity in the environment. This step requires drafting. Then come the ideas of what it will look

like physically in the space. This involves sketching in more detail and in color. Once I think I am on the right track, and have all the elements of design, I make a ¼” scale model of the set. Using the model, I make construction drawings and hold conferences with the technicians. It is the job of the technicians to build, paint, and install the set. The final steps are to add lights, sound, and the actors.

PI’ve had a lot of years to practice, but it definitely takes skill and a lot of discipline to maintain everything in scale. I have rulers that are marked in various scales so that when I am drawing I can use them to help me measure. For every one foot in real life, it shows up as a ¼” on the model. The rulers help me to stay consistent from the model to the real life set.

PI think most of the audience that comes to see A Christmas Carol is new each year, so not everyone sees the same set year after year. And sometimes when we do change the set, the people who are returning to see the show are disappointed because it’s not what they remembered from when they saw it as a child, for example. I think if people enjoy their first experience they want to bring their family and friends to share in that same experience.

ActivitY be a graphic Designer! Create a poster or large ad for a production of A Christmas Carol. It must include the title of the play, the playwright and Charles Dickens’ name, the dates of the show(s), and address of the theatre (or your school). Then draw or paint an image that you think will draw in audiences to see the show. Remember, you are trying to express information with your poster so make it visible and fun.

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liTerary WriTing

The last of the three spirits in A Christmas Carol shows Scrooge scenes from the future. Write a play or scene that takes place in the future. How far in the future will you set your play? Do the characters in your play face new problems or have goals different from the goals many people have today? Do the characters talk or move differently from how people talk and move now? ALSO: As you write stage directions•, think about how setting your play in the future might affect the sets, lights, and costumes, etc.

• stage directions (n.): the words in the script that are not spoken by the actors; the words that provide clues or suggestions about how to stage the play.

TransacTive WriTing Write a review of Actors Theatre’s A Christmas Carol. Describe what it was like to watch the play, but do not write about only the story or plot of the play. Think about HOW the play tells its story. Make the experience of watching the play come alive for your reader by writing about several of the play’s many elements, including sets, lights, and costumes, as well as how the actors performed their roles and how the director realized her or his vision of the play. Were there some parts of A Christmas Carol you enjoyed more than other parts? If so, why?

personal WriTing In A Christmas Carol, Scrooge’s encounters with the three spirits change his opinions about how he should treat fellow human beings. Write about someone who has changed your mind about how you should behave with other people. What did this person do or say to change your point of view? How has your thinking or behavior changed as a result?

WriTing porTfolio

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nEw VoICEStEn-mInUtE PLAY ContEStThe clock is ticking. If you are a young person who fancies yourself a playwright, now is your time to act, or better yet, write! The deadline to enter the New Voices Ten-Minute Play Contest is drawing near. As the clock strikes 12 midnight on December 31, the reading will begin to determine which eight ten-minute plays will be fully produced and performed onstage at Actors Theatre in April. Playwrights must live in our region and be 18 or younger. For more information about the New Voices Ten-Minute Play Contest and the New Voices Young Playwright’s Festival, please visit ActorsTheatre.org.

deadline: December 31

IntroDUCInG neW voices At wALDEn thEAtrE!

hUMana fesTival college DaysMarch 12 - 14, 2010

Have a college student or professor in your life? College Days weekend is a three-day immersion into the world-renowned Humana Festival. College students and faculty are invited backstage to explore this festival firsthand and connect with people at the forefront of the field. If you know someone interested in a career in theatre, this weekend just might change his or her life.

College Days attendees will see astonishing world premiere plays, tour Actors Theatre inside and out, meet Actors Theatre staff and the Humana Festival creative teams, participate in career development workshops with our staff, audition for our Acting Apprentice Company or interview for a professional internship at the theatre and rub elbows with the best in the field.

Featured playwrights: Deborah Zoe Laufer, Deborah Stein, Victoria Stewart, Steve Epp, Cory Hinkle, Dominic Orlando, Dominique Serrand, Scott Organ, Lisa Dillman, Dan O’Brien, and Kirk Lynn pacKages only $99!Reservations: 502-585-1210

Beginning this January, Actors Theatre of Louisville will partner with Walden Theatre, Louisville’s award-winning theatre conservatory for young people, to offer a 12-session playwriting class for young creative writers looking to gain insight and practice creating stories for the stage. Students will write, read, share and respond to work written in and out of class, and each student will write at least one ten-minute play. The class will also include an insider’s look into the world renowned Humana Festival of New American Plays at Actors Theatre of Louisville. Students will see three Humana Festival plays and have the opportunity to meet with Humana Festival creative teams.

For more information or to enroll, please contact Walden Theatre at (502) 589-0084, or visit www.WaldenTheatre.org

UpcoMing opporTUniTies

SPonSorED BY thE norton FoUnDAtIon