GRUMPY OLD MEN
Christopher Plummer joins a long line of actors to play Scrooge on the big screen. Time will tell where he ranks. Meanwhile, let’s rate the others, listed from best to meh-est.
Alastair Sim (A Christmas Carol, 1951): In this black-and-white staple — best viewed on Christmas Eve — Scottish actor Sim manages to be both the most bitter and, somehow, the most redeemable version of the legendary miser.
Michael Caine (The Muppet Christmas Carol, 1992): Despite the fact that most of his castmates are of the felt variety, Caine plays a perfectly cranky — and comically giddy — Scrooge in this kid-friendly Brian Henson adaptation.
Scrooge McDuck (Mickey’s Christmas Carol, 1983): Alan Young gives voice to the foul-intentioned fowl for the first time here, and he stuck with the role until his death in 2016. Though the animated short was nominated for an Oscar, Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert gave it two thumbs down.
Jim Carrey (A Christmas Carol, 2009): Blasphemy for some but probably more accessible for today’s kids, this version boasts impressive animation from Disney in the literal sense, and both literally and figuratively from Carrey in the title role.
Albert Finney (Scrooge, 1970): Finney plays it straight and earnest (though with an odd accent) in this needlessly musicalized version that owes as much to Oliver! as to Dickens.
Bill Murray (Scrooged, 1988): As TV executive Frank Cross, Murray isn’t Scrooge in the traditional sense. But his attitude stinks, so one day in December, those three ghosts decide to pay him a visit. Murray starts out strong in the role, but the ending where he becomes a changed man feels a little forced.
Honourable mentions: Others to have donned Scrooge’s nightcap include Yosemite Sam (with Bugs Bunny as the ghost, in 1979’s Bugs Bunny’s Looney Christmas Tales), George C. Scott (1984), Captain Picard, er, Patrick Stewart (1999), Kelsey Grammer (2004) and Emmanuelle Vaugier as a modern, driven publishing executive, opposite Carrie Fisher as the ghost of her former boss, Eve, in 2012’s It’s Christmas, Carol!