Combining SFMT's popular radio version, original un-produced stage adaptation, and unvarnished revolutionary agenda, we will develop the play through table readings and limited book-in-hand presentations and inviting audience feedback. Our goal is to finish the workshop with an adaptation that can be produced each year, which sways closer to Dickens’ story and intention; If Christmas is the one time of the year when we reject the greed of the few and dehumanization of the many, when we are our best selves, why can’t we be like that all year?

In 1843 Charles Dickens wrote an amazing story that spelled out in a clear, entertaining way, the inhuman effects of the new system that was sweeping England - Industrial Capitalism. Since then the same class of wealthy people Dickens indicted for their selfishness and inhumanity have hijacked the story, changing it from a powerful expose of the oppression of the working class to a fun-filled story about a greedy old codger and his spooky reclamation, from starving children begging to children happily singing carols, and in 2022 we have gone from the story of the impoverished millions oppressed by a system that literally saw them as grist for the mill to an annual tv/movie/theatre cash cow about the One Bad Man who, when he changes, guarantees a Merry Christmas for all. That is not what Dickens intended. He wanted to change the world.

“A Red Carol” - The Mime Troupe’s adaptation by our Resident Playwright and Guggenheim Fellow Michael Gene Sullivan, with traditional labor tunes arranged by Danial Savio, and with an all-star cast of Mime Troupers - reclaims this story for the rest of us - for the 99% who don't have Scrooge's dough, the 99% who live the lives of the Cratchits.