THURSDAY, DECEMBER 11, 2025
A Christmas Carol (2025)
Dan Gordon, Richard Clements and Shaun Blaney in 'A Christmas Carol'.
Photo: Melissa Gordon
Retrospective and rather revolutionary refreshment is the order of the day and indeed the month in Belfast's Lyric Theatre as Marie Jones's engaging and ambitious adaptation of Charles Dickens's A Christmas Carol comes back to the main stage for a second helping after a successful run last year. As before, it's a humorous and harmonious feast with very impressive visuals, but on this occasion the flow feels smoother and the nuance seems more pronounced. The chance to take the production beyond its endearing rawness and into more seasoned and perhaps more inspired territory is taken by Jones, director Matthew McElhinney, the crew and eight returning cast members from 2024-25 plus newcomers Kealan McAllister (replacing Jonny Grogan) and Shaun Blaney (replacing Matthew Forsythe). It's a tale of production-to-production transition whose development echoes Cynthia Erivo and Arianda Grande's growing ease with their famous on screen roles - and, for definite want of better words, it's rather wicked. For good reasons, of course.
When you align the legendary character of Ebenezer Scrooge with the character of historical Belfast and the deliberate anachronisms that are worthy of The Muppets – and Jones has confessed in her programme notes that The Muppet Christmas Carol is her favourite adaptation – you are bound to, at the very least, get something you will never forget. And the unforgettable is here in many a way, with the colourful liveliness and darkened layers in Stuart Marshall's set, Mary Tumelty's lighting and Catherine Kodicek's costumes remaining an emboldening accompaniment to a lush smorgasbord of set-pieces, one liners and character development both familiar and unfamiliar – a vital replay of a vital take on a vital seasonal story.
That's three "vitals". So, what amplifies the "vital" in this endeavour? Well, to begin with, you're seeing humanity in the set as well as in every single performance. The sight of Joy's Entry and Pottinger's Entry compel one to consider their present-day equivalents and ponder exactly what and who they connect. Each is a passage between contrasts, people and places, a link between a pedestrianised and a non-pedestrianised street, with each passage and street distinctively awash in the vibrancy of Christmas lights, holiday decorations and public gatherings during the season. Their tones translate into the overall tenor of McElhinney's production – a place for re-unions and re-discoveries which can bring you to life and keep you from being alone, and that goes for the audience as well as the arc of Dan Gordon's Scrooge.
Marty Maguire as Jacob Marley in 'A Christmas Carol'. Photo: Melissa Gordon
Once more, Gordon is tremendous to watch. Carrying a reservedly venomous streak with hilariously recognisable sprinklings of Joe Pesci-esque mutterings, he unsettles as much as he pleases and amuses, again proving perfectly pivotal for the excellent supporting cast, Garth McConaghie's compositions and Fleur Mellor's choreography. The level of care and detail that goes into the family gatherings, stormy seas and carnival atmospherics which partly comprise Scrooge's facing of the Ghosts of Christmas Past, Present and Future, and pretty much everything else, is at times astounding and reflective of the clear level of delight that every performer, the new arrivals included, shows in working or re-working with the material.
The fears and feelings of connection, misconnection or worse, no connection are perhaps what linger longest from A Christmas Carol this time – the painful potential in not getting to know, or not having the time to get to know, the people closest to you either personally or professionally, and how that can be contrasted, in turn, with the possibly wondrous rewards in actually being able to get to know them. There is also something to be said for Jones's examination of the multifaceted purpose and positivity in individual and group personalities, and how thorough and crucial that is in the light of not only the Christmas season but lives in general. Such lives, on stage, made up of multiple meetings, partings and so much more, which we have had the privilege of experiencing in another memorable Lyric Theatre production.
Simon Fallaha
A Christmas Carol runs at Belfast's Lyric Theatre until Saturday January 10, 2026. For more information, and tickets, click here.