A Christmas Carol

A Christmas Carol at Spencer Theatre At Kansas City Repertory Theatre

Ebenezer Scrooge has convinced himself that warmth costs more than it's worth—firewood, sentiment, connection, all pointless expenses when you could just build a taller wall around your counting-house and hoard another coin. Mark Robbins takes on the role of Scrooge in Kansas City Repertory Theatre's production of A Christmas Carol at Spencer Theatre, and that miserable philosophy sets Charles Dickens’s ghosts a difficult task. The miser gets dragged through time by three relentless spirits—Christmas Past, Present and Future—with his chance at happiness hanging in the balance.

What keeps this story from turning preachy is the Cratchits. Bob Cratchit works for starvation wages yet manages to scrape together a family Christmas dinner, and Tiny Tim and the Cratchits make generosity visible in ways no ghost lecture ever could. Fezziwig throws a party where everyone dances; the Cratchits toast each other over a modest goose. You see what Scrooge is missing, not because you're told he's missing it, but because you watch other people enjoy what he refuses.

The local KCRep production includes the Candlelight Carol, a musical moment that gives this version a specific theatrical identity beyond the countless film adaptations cycling through cable every December. This becomes a shared live family story, not another seasonal obligation ticked off a list. The story still asks whether a person can change, and whether anyone should bother hoping they will.

Get tickets for A Christmas Carol at Spencer Theatre and share Dickens’s ghostly Christmas story.