When entering the theater for "A Hipmas Carol", ignore the raucus lobby crowd downing buckets of beer. Don't get caught up in their jubilant progression to a dark theater. Don't sit down, open a cold one and take fifteen minutes to figure out that the show you are watching is not a "scat, jazzy" version of "A Christmas Carol."
If you dash out of the theater, stumble down a drafty staircase, decide that you are going to be in big trouble for missing the first quarter of the show you are there to review, don't fret! The cast of A Hipmas Carol will be even later to arrive than you.
The Hipmas stage is just as sparse as its plot, with only a few Christmas trees and a fireplace tucked in the middle. After being greeted by a folksy guitar player moaning a tune about lost love, Ritch Valadez (music and sound effects) played a stirring electric guitar version of "Silent Night." Not a bad song to walk in on, but that's when the show should have started.
Instead, Tyler Bohne (Scrooge, among other characters) began riffing with a drunk couple in the corner about how his partner in crime, Patrick Zielinski (Ghosts, among other characters), hadn't shown up for the show. Turns out they are, "killing time," the folk singer, the guitar player and Bohne, now telling cheesy Christmas jokes.
Even with the late start, which very likely could have been a planned part of the show, and drunken interruptions, this play lacks the emotional power of Dickens's classic story. The rhyming couplets killed the depth of the original characters and the use of urban "jive" personas didn't do anything to improve the Hipmas experience. In total, the actual story of the show only took up half of the stage time.
After nine years of performing in Chicago, perhaps it's time for "A Hipmas Carol" to make a graceful exit.
Reviewed by Centerstage!
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