So, the 1990 BBC Radio adaptation of "A Christmas Carol" runs for an extremely generous 90 minutes, so they can get just about every story element in there, but do they stay faithful to the source or do they take some wacky liberties?
Oh, they take some liberties, and they are wacky!
On the whole, the adaptation is pretty faithful, with a lot of narration taken largely verbatim from the book. The dialogue is also about the same, with a few little changes here and there. The beginning seems so faithful that you're lulled into thinking this will be strictly "by the book," if you will.
A couple of things caught my ear early on, such as Fred calling Scrooge "Uncle Scrooge" when he drops by the office and Bob Cratchit scoffing when the charity collector mentions Marley's "liberality!"
A couple of other things ae thrown in for more of an audio experience, I think, such as Scrooge moaning and groaning in the background a lot and Marley's Ghost really moaning when appearing in Scrooge's knocker.
When the Ghost of Christmas Past takes Scrooge on his journey, things start veering away from the book.
An odd change is giving the schoolmaster a number of lines. When he comes to tell young Ebenezer that he has a visitor (Fan), he accuses Scrooge of hiding and it's implied that Ebenezer is abused. Not sure what they're going for there, but it's unpleasant.
At Fezziwig's party, Fezziwig gets quite a few extra lines and he also calls the fiddler by name (John Jackson) and talks about said fiddler a bit.
The first really big change comes next, and it's the old standby of having Belle show up at Fezziwig's party. This then takes the more unusual, but not unheard of step of Belle breaking up with Ebenezer at the party.
What is different is that Belle namedrops Jacob Marley, as in Ebenezer going into business with Marley is the last straw!
That's a little different, but not too wacky. The extreme wackiness comes when we next encounter Belle as a married woman. She's. Married. To... (SPOILER) Dick Wilkins! Oh, snap! Who saw that coming? That's a new one on me, but I love a good twist!
In the Christmas Present sequence, the usual things happen with a couple of minor type changes.
Mrs. Cratchit calls one of the kids "Charlotte," which keeps the tradition of naming one or both of those mystery Cratchit kids.
The other change is siemthung I don't care for... Topper is given a pronoynced stutter. I guess it's supposed to be for comedic effect and it's not funny and comes off to me as unsympathetic towrd people who have actual speech issues. It seems odd for soemthng from 1990 to be so isnsnitive.
Anyway, the Christas Yet to COme seunce goes more or less as expetecd, but it's perhaps woth noting that Mrs. Dilber is dientifed as the charwoman, but we all know she's the laundress!
Another fun little twist comes during the "present" when Scrooge is out and about on Christmas morning. He runs into the charity collector, who reveals himself to us as the narrator! Kind of a fun little thing.
The ending here is changed and it follows another common variation with Scrooge going to Bob Cratchit's house on Christmas morning. This is found in almost as many versions as the idea of Belle being at Fezziwig's party.
As is usually the case, he runs into Fred and his wife along the way and accepts their dinner invitation. He mentions Topper and Fred's wife's sister, which puzzles Fred's wife. This shows, however, that this version does not imply that Scrooge dreamt the whole thing.
Since this version attempts to keep a lot of the original dialogue, yet changes some things, we wind up with some awkwardness at times. Specifically, Scrooge tells Bob that they'll discuss his affairs that afternoon over the mandatory Christmas bowl of you-know-what. Fine, except that dialogue was meant for December 26, not December 25. That afternoon Bob will be eating a ginormous turkey and Scrooge will be at Fred's house. Picky, I know!
In any event, an interesting script. It's sort of faithful, sort of not.
SO many versions have Belle at Fezzwig's and Scrooge visiting the Cratchits on Christmas morning, that a casual listener to this program wouldn't think they changed a thing!
