A Christmas Carol Goes Wrong

(2017)
Directed by Richard Boden
Written by Henry Lewis, Jonathan Sayer, Henry Shields
Starring Derek Jacobi, Diana Rigg, Henry Shields, Henry Lewis, Jonathan Sayer, Nancy Zamit
IMDB Entry

A Christmas Carol has been adapted hundreds of times. There are debates as to who played the best Scrooge. But there is nothing to match A Christmas Carol Goes Wrong.

It starts out as a standard adaptation, with Derek Jacobi as Scrooge. But as it gets started, the Cornley Polytechnic Drama Society abducts the BBC Studios and Jacobi and puts on their own production.

As the title states, everything goes wrong. Marley’s corpse falls out of the coffin, the door to Scrooge’s office won’t open (so he walks around to the side of the set), Diana Rigg (the aunt of one of the actresses) can’t make it on time to narrate, so has to do it on her cell phone. Bob Cratchit can’t remember his lines, so they are written (blatantly) all over the set. Props fail and stagehands struggle to make them work and the camera manages to show them whenever they aren’t supposed to be shown. There is dissention as to who will play Scrooge, ridiculous special effects, CGI failures, and pratfalls galore.

The result is hilarious. If you’ve ever been involved in a theater production, it’s even funnier as the actors try to pretend that everything is fine and they’re not in the middle of a disaster.  It’s pure slapstick, and perfectly done.

It's available on Youtube.