A Little Advertising!

 I don't think I've seen this ad before:

Interesting that "The Little Cratchits" get some love!

"A Christmas Carol" All-Star Team - Day 23

We're getting near the end of our countdown of the members of the "A Christmas Carol" All-Star Team, so we land on the second biggest character - Bob Cratchit!

Bob features in the beginning and end "real time" segments as well as the Christmas Present and Christmas Yet to Come scenes, so he has a big impact.

I find that Bob Cratchit portrayals are all over the place in various adaptations, but I've said before that a good Bob to me is a humble and loyal employee. He knows he needs his job, but I don't think he's resentful, or else he wouldn't raise a toast to "the founder of the feast" at his family's Christmas dinner.

I think a lot of Bobs argue with Scrooge too much, which is something that up with which Scrooge would not put!

So, who makes a really good Bob from a notable adaptation that hasn't been represented yet? Donald Calthrop from the 1935 British production "Scrooge," starring Seymour Hicks as Scrooge:

I know I've said before that he looks like he stepped out of the pages of an old edition of "A Christmas Carol" but he acts the part in addition to looking the part:

Donald Calthrop is another actor that I really don't know outside of this part. He's in quite a few British films - I don't think he was ever in a US production - from the silent era up through his death in 1940.

But he certainly left his mark as Bob Cratchit!

"Scrooge" (1935) Lobby Cards and Stills

We're still in lobby card mode as we turn our attention to another notable British film version of "A Christmas Carol" titled "Scrooge," this one the 1935 effort starring Sir Seymour Hicks.

Actually, lobby cards from this film are hard to find, but there's the one above and this one below, both from the American release through Paramount Pictures:

There are some stills from the movie too, including these interesting portraits of the major players:

Fun to see these. They're clearer than prints of the movie that are kicking around!

Scrooge (1935) - Part 3

Now we're going to take a look at some of the details left in, left out or added to the 1935 British production "Scrooge" starring Sir Seymour Hicks. As previously mentioned, there's a short version and a long version. We're going to deal with long version, as the short version cuts out some scenes toward the end.

The credits from the long version have a hand opening on a book, stopping at the preface. The preface is signed by Charles Dickens with a date of December 1843, and the camera dissolves into a bigger December 1843 to indicate that's when the story takes place.

This brings up an interesting point. I don't think that the story literally takes place in 1843. Once Dickens gets down to business to tell the story, he says, "Once upon a time..." which indicates these events happened in the past. That's also how we know at the end that Tiny Tim did not die.

In any event, we open with a shot of London, which I think is a bunch of miniatures, but kind of cool in a retro way. There's a charm there that you don't find with CGI these days.

Since the book wasn't opened as far as the beginning of the story and there's no narrator, so Scrooge gets some expository dialogue to say that Marley was dead as a doornail.

We get the usual business at the office, with Bob Cratchit and the coal, the nephew and the gentlemen. I like Cratchit muttering about the coal and Scrooge telling him to stop.

We get a pretty fun montage when Scrooge is going home, as he's contrasted with other people with their holiday festivities, including the Lord Mayor's dinner, which we always hear about and rarely get to see. The Lord mayor's secretary gets in a really good quip that I won't spoil!

when Scrooge gets home, he sees Marley's face in the knocker. We see it too, but we don't realize yet that;s as much as we'll see! It looks like Marley's name is scratched out on the nameplate with Scrooge's added in, which makes sense as that had been Marley's house before he died.

Scrooge is sufficiently shaken by that to inspect his chambers for intruders, including the dressing gown, which was "hanging up in a suspicious attitude against the wall." Love the reference to the original text!

When Marley's Ghost shows up, we can hear him but cannot see him. I think he says, "Look well, Ebenezer Scrooge, for only you can see me," more for our benefit. Well, we're not Scrooge and we can't see him, so he's not wrong.

There seems to be an urban legend that Claude Rains provides the voice of Marley's Ghost. I don't think that's the case, as it doesn't sound particularly like him. Did that only get started because Claude Rains played/voiced "The Invisible Man" in that 1933 film? Who knows?

If I were in charge, I would've had Marley's ghost be visible. I don't know what 1935 audiences thought of that, but it seems like they're cheaping out. And it probably makes modern audiences think that special effects weren't sophisticated enough in 1935 to pull it off, which is certainly not the case. They did it pretty convincingly in that 1910 silent film we were looking at earlier!

Anyway, Marley's Ghost lays it out and actually explains who each of the other three spirits will be. When he departs with his customary, "Look to see me know more," he's not kidding.

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(This last comment was from my helper, Slugger the Cat!)

So, we didn't see Marley's Ghost, but will we see the others? Well, not the Ghost of Christmas Past, as that's represented by a glowing outline of a woman, which speaks with a male voice. That gives it that kind of you-don't-really-know-what it-is vibe.

We only get two scenes from the past, both with young Scrooge and Belle. Seymour Hicks doesn't look too young, but, whatever.

I really like the first scene, which changes things up  by having  Belle come into Scrooge's office while he's giving hard time to a poor couple who need more time to repay their debt. Belle gets to see him in action and does not like it! This is the scene with Maurice Evans, by the way, who's more subdued than in his later, better-known roles.

We then see Belle with her husband and family and it seems like she has a zillion kids! 

These scenes from the past are framed in kind of a white glow, which is a nice touch. The Christmas Past segment is short, but I like what's there.

We finally do get to see one of the spirits when the Ghost of Christmas Present appears. He has a different appearance from the usual depiction, as previously mentioned.

We see Bob carrying Tiny Tim home from church and they stop to buy a little toy boat, which is sweet. All the kids are at home, with Martha hiding and the usual antics. Tiny Tim even gets to sing!

A nice interpretation of the Cratchit's Christmas dinner follows. No wonder Scrooge says he envies them!

We then get too see the guys in the lighthouse and on board a ship celebrate the holiday. Another seldom seen detail from the book. A sort of nod to the book is having one of the sailor's laugh merge into Fred laughing at his party.

Fred doles out plenty of punch to his guests while comically talking about his uncle and everyone has a good time playing that "yes or no" game.

This version doesn't shy away from some of the grimmer themes from the book, but we don't get Ignorance and Want here.

We do get plenty of grimness in the future, however!

The Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come isn't really seen here either. It's a shadow, which is effective now that we've gotten used to the idea of not seeing the ghosts. Scrooge is often scene within the shadow and these scenes have a black border around them.

In the future, we see the other businessmen talking about Scrooge, and then we get a wild scene inside Old Joe's place.

This scene is so creepy! Old Joe, the undertaker, laundress and charwoman are almost as cartoony looking as their counterparts in "Mister Magoo's Christmas Carol!" It's effective! Except for Old Joe himself, nobody else is called by name in this scene, so we don't have the Mrs. Dilber issue.

Scrooge sees his body, which he won't admit is his, them we go to the Cratchit's house.

Tiny Tim has died, which is sad enough, but we actually see his body laid out as described in the book!

Adding to the creepiness is the mysterious hand that closes the door behind Bob when he enters that room. Is that the same hand that was turning the pages of the book during the credits? Is it attached to a person?

Back in the present, things are also a little wacky. The charwoman comes in while Scrooge is jumping around and just stares with an odd look on her face. Scrooge calls out the window to have the kid buy the turkey, but the kid can't wake the poulterer, so Scrooge has to go over himself. After all that, the turkey doesn't even look all that big! All in all, this sequence is more odd than anything.

Once Scrooge gets going and makes his donation to those charity guys, we get a really well-played scene of him going to Fred's for dinner. If Scrooge getting teary-eyed while looking at the Christmas tree and thinking of Tiny Tim singing doesn't bring a tear to your eye as well, then...

We cut from here to the next morning where we see Bob and his family at breakfast. That pastry nothing that Mrs. Cratchit is cutting looks interesting, but Bob can't chow down because he's running late.

The scene with Scrooge surprising Bob at the office is faithful to the book, but after Bob leaves, we see Scrooge go to church, where he runs into Bob. The mysterious hand closes the book and it's the end!

I think this is a really solid version. It has tons of atmosphere and lots of dialogue and detail right out of the book.

I'm really glad that this version is around, as it's historically significant as it's the first full-length talking adaptation and it also preserves the performance of a renowned Scrooge.

I do think you need to look at it for what it is, though, with something of a 1930s lens. If you can do that, it's an enjoyable movie and not just a history lesson!

Scrooge (1935) - Part 2

Let's take a look at the cast and characters of the 1935 British movie "Scrooge."

Leading the way, of course, is Sir Seymour Hicks as Scrooge. He had apparently been playing Scrooge on stage since 1901 and had even made a short, silent version in 1913, which we'll dig up soon, So, he certainly knew his way around the role. It shows and he's terrific.

He also plays young Scrooge in the Christmas Past segment, but I would not say he's particularly convincing. I guess he looks younger, but certainly not young. No Albert Finney!

I presume this film was sold to British audiences on the strength of Hicks's fame as Scrooge, but I can't seem to dig up any original British advertising. The original titles have his name above the title in huge letters, but without the Sir appellation.

The ads from 1935 that are kicking around seem to be from the American release, as they credit Adolph Zukor and Paramount, rather than Julius Hagen and Twickenham Studios, the actual British producer. Those American ads don't give Hicks special billing (though they do give him the Sir) and lump him in with Donald Cathrop, who played Bob Cratchit. I'm guessing that's because they couldn't sell the movie to American audience based on Seymour Hicks and not because Donald Calthrop had a big American following!

In any event, Donald Calthrop does make a great Bob Cratchit. He literally looks like he could have walked off the page of an earlier edition of the book. Maybe it's the one that the mysterious hand is flipping through during the credits!

Tiny Tim here is played by Phillip Frost. He's OK, doesn't look all that sick, but not too healthy either. The part's not built up here, so he doesn't wear out his welcome.

Belle has interesting casting here. She's played by Mary Glynne, who was 40 at the time. Not that she looks old, but she's more mature than the usual Belle. I'm guessing that's because young Scrooge, as mentioned, doesn't look too young himself! She does a good job in her two scenes.

 The other assorted characters seem well-cast, with Old Joe and that bunch being extremely creepy!

So, what about the ghosts? Well, that's where things get really interesting! You actually only see one ghost, the Ghost of Christmas Present. The others are presented in other manners, which we'll get into next time.

The Ghost of Christmas Present has a different look from what we're used to seeing, particularly that he has no beard. He does look like some depictions from various editions of the book, however. The actor, Oscar Asche, has kind of a weird delivery, pausing at odd times. Sometimes he's pausing to take another bite of a drumstick, which is wacky fun!

On the whole, I think everybody's pretty well-cast here. This production, however, is another one in which I'm not familiar with the actors from other movies, so I buy them in their roles. I watch a ton of movies from the 1930s, but they're almost always from Hollywood. These guys seemed to be exclusively in British films, some in quite a few.

The lone exception is Maurice Evans, who appears in the Christmas Past sequence as "A Poor Man." Years later, he popped up on American TV as Samantha's father on "Bewitched" and The Puzzler on "Batman" then played perhaps his most remembered role, Dr. Zaius in the first two "Planet of the Apes" movies. Some fun stuff there!

So, we have a good cast. What are they given to work with?

Scrooge (1935) - Part 1

Scrooge (1935)
Director: Henry Edwards
Scrooge: Seymour Hicks

Now we'll take a look at another full-length movie adaptation: "Scrooge," a 1935 British production starring Sir Seymour Hicks.

This is a version I had heard about way back in the pre-internet days when hearing about such things was much harder! I knew this was older than the 1938 MGM version and that Sir Seymour Hicks was renowned for his portrayal of Scrooge, but had never seen it on TV.

Then in the mid-1980s, home video came along and all sorts of public domain movies such as this became available. In horrible umpteenth generation copies, but you could see stuff you had never seen before.

When I finally got my mitts on this thing, I felt like I was holding the Rosetta Stone - the first full-length talking version of "A Christmas Carol."

Side note: It's interesting that this movie and its fellow British theatrical versions from 1951 and 1970 were all titled "Scrooge" rather than "A Christmas Carol." Coincidence? Who knows?

Anyway, there are a couple of different cuts of this film, one running about an hour and the other about 17 minutes longer than that. I don't know why there are two versions, but they have different credits. The short cut has just static title cards with very brief credits, whereas the long cut has a hand opening a book of "A Christmas Carol," then turning the pages to reveal longer credits, winding up at the preface. Interestingly, the short version bills Philip Frost (as Tiny Tim) much higher.

The first copy of this film that I had on VHS was a washed out short version. Once DVDs came out, I got a better transfer of the longer version. Nowadays because it's in the public domain, all sorts of videos of varying quality pop up all over the place. There's even a colorized version!

I don't know if the original elements still exist, so we have to take what we can get, but I'd love to see a copy that's as clean as that 1938 MGM version. Only three years passed in between them, but it seems like light years.

In any event, I really like this version. It has tons of atmosphere and a few touches not commonly seen. And Sir Seymour Hicks is certainly a great Scrooge. I can see it being a tough watch for the average modern viewer, however, as the image and sound are a little rough and it's definitely dated without much in the way of special effects and heavy use of background music.

But, if you already like movies from the '30s and Scrooge, this is a good one!