The BBC radio broadcast of "A Christmas Carol" from 1950 starring Alec Guinness as Scrooge is an interesting little thing.
This is another one of those half-hourish adaptations, so there's not time for everything. I usually look at these as presenting highlights of the story, with the audience's knowledge of the complete story filling on the gaps.
If you never heard/read/saw any other version of "A Christmas Carol," this would leave you scratching your head. But if you do know the story, it's fun!
One thing you may have noticed from those links to the show is that the year(s) listed is all over the place.
But, the "Radio Times" listing definitely puts the year as 1950. I understand it was rebroadcast in subsequent years, but 1950 was the first time.
One thing I like about this version is that it seems so British, which, naturally, fits the source material. So many versions are American with a bit of a British twist. Since this is from the BBC, I feel like we Americans are getting a sneak peek at a real British production!
An interesting contrast is that the narrator, Keith Pyott, uses the original text to set the scene in a very stiff upper lip voice, whereas, say, on Basil Rathbone's version, narrator Harlow Wilcox uses his very American voice with original material. And this narrator is a million times drier than Richard Hale on Lionel Barrymore's studio recording.
Even at the very beginning, the announcer says, "The BBC presents a famous actor in a radio adaptation of a famous story." Wow, those British announcers sure are tight-lipped!
So, what did they include in this version anyway? Let's see...
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