CHRISTMAS CAROL CARES
Holiday classic a gift for food bank
SPOTLIGHT Theatre Calgary presents A Christmas Carol through Dec. 24. Information: Theatrecalgary.com
The holiday season is upon us, so it’s time to talk turkey or, more specifically, Toonies for Turkeys.
For the past 20 years, during the curtain call for Theatre Calgary’s A Christmas Carol, Stephen Hair has stepped forward and asked the audiences to help fill the Food Bank’s demand for turkeys by donating their change. Hold onto your hats people. That simple request has already garnered $1,862,311.81 for the Calgary Food Bank.
Hair, who returns this year for his 23rd year as that old, highly redeemable skinflint Ebenezer Scrooge, recalls how this incredible tradition began.
“I was in my third year as Scrooge and it became a bit of a tradition with the cast to collect change for the Food Bank on our opening night performance.
“Lindsay Burns, who was playing Mrs. Cratchit that year, asked if I thought the management at Theatre Calgary would allow us to ask the audience to add their change to our contribution.”
Hair asked and received permission to ask that opening night audience in 1997 to help enrich the cast’s contribution.
“It was meant to be a one-nightonly request and we thought, if we were very lucky, we might raise $500.
“We were astonished when the audience donated $1,500, and so we decided to ask all of our audiences that year to help us help the Food Bank.”
Hair says he knows this will be a particularly difficult year for many people but adds, “Calgarians have always stepped up in the past when we’ve had economic downturns, so I have confidence they’ll do the same this year.”
Hair says the success of Toonies for Turkeys is due in part to the message in Dickens’ A Christmas Carol.
“It’s all about being charitable and the audience sees how much joy Scrooge gets from being charitable and it helps that it’s Scrooge at the end of the show who asks the audiences to help people who are less fortunate.”
Shane Homes and the Cal Wenzel Family Foundation are kick-starting this year’s Toonies for Turkeys drive with a $20,000 donation.
This year marks the 30th anniversary of TC’s A Christmas Carol, and Hair’s 28th time as part of the event.
“For my first appearance in A Christmas Carol I played Dickens, who was acting as the narrator of the show, and subsequently I played characters like Marley’s ghost, the Ghost of Christmas Future and various other characters.”
Hair says he’s probably played Scrooge to at least a dozen different Tiny Tims, pointing out that Caden Douglas, his first Tiny Tim, is now a seasoned actor who was in the travelling production of War Horse, and Brendan Prost is now an independent filmmaker.
Traditionally, every five years, Theatre Calgary completely revamps its A Christmas Carol, starting with a new script.
This current script has proven so popular, TC decided to tweak it rather than scrap it.
Hair has agreed not to let too many cats out of their bags, but says the front curtain now gives the show a “more warm, comforting storybook look and there is a great new scene for young Scrooge, who ends up dreaming about sword fighting with pirates.
“Scrooge gets a wall in his bedroom now,” says Hair.
The 2016 edition of A Christmas Carol runs in the Max Bell Theatre until Dec. 24. Tickets are available at theatrecalgary.com or by calling 403-294-7474.