The Barnstable High School Drama Club presents Dickens' "A Christmas Carol"

Drama club will present the holiday favorite this November--with a special twist

HYANNIS - The Barnstable High School Drama Club will present Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol, opening November 21st, but as you might expect with this group, you can look forward to a new twist on the beloved classic.

The Drama Club will have one traditional cast with Scrooge as a man (Jason Pacella, Class of ‘08), but the second cast will feature Caitlin Gardipe (Class of ‘08) portraying Ebenezer Scrooge as a woman. 

Actually, this will be the second time the BHSDC will break the gender barrier by featuring a female Scrooge, as it did back in its 1996 production of Carol. 

“It’s hard not to give a superior actress a chance to play one of the most iconic characters ever written,” said John Sullivan, director of A Christmas Carol.

“When we changed gender back in 1996, I called my brother Fred (an actor at Trinity Rep in Rhode Island) to ask what he thought of changing the gender of Scrooge. Before I could mention my plans, he blurted out, ‘Guess what? Trinity Rep is going to have an actress play Scrooge this year.’ So I kept my mouth shut and realized I had my answer.”

This version of A Christmas Carol should prove to be as spectacular as the Drama Club’s last production, The Wizard of Oz which played to sold out crowds in March. “We’re pulling out all stops with this production,” said Sullivan. “We’re hiring Flying by Foy to make the ghosts fly, musicians dressed in traditional garb wander the set made to look like an elaborate pop-up book and using our new snow machines to make it snow over our re-creation of Dickens’ London of 1843."

“The costumes will also lend an air of the magical with all the ghosts that visit Scrooge designed and built by club members.” 

This production will also mark the second time the Drama Club is working with the Cape Cod Hospital Auxiliary. Last year the production of Fiddler on the Roof helped raise over $30,000.

“I believe working with the hospital gives the cast more a sense of community, which is necessary to instill in high-schoolers,” said Sullivan. ”Sometimes teenagers don’t think the world goes any further than their X-Boxes. Working with charities and outside community organizations is a chance to give back to the town in which they live.

“And as Dickens wrote in A Christmas Carol, ‘At this festive season of the year, Mr. Scrooge, it is more than usually desirable that we should make some slight provision for the poor and destitute, who suffer greatly at the present time.’  To that end the Drama Club hopes to help make a difference in the community.”

A Christmas Carol will be performed in the Barnstable High School Performing Arts Center at 744 West Main Street, Hyannis. Shows will be November 21, 22, 28, 29 at 7 PM and 22,23,29,30 at 2 PM. All tickets are $10. More information can be obtained by calling (508) 771-6246.

Release courtesy of BHSDC.