I wanted my version to move away from the classic, old-school version that everyone knows. I wanted to create something that\u2019s relevant and alive and contemporary. So I really thought hard about what it means to bring this story into 2018. And, finally, it struck me: I had to reinvent the concept of the miser for the world in which we live. Societal attitudes and concepts of wealth have shifted since Dickens\u2019 time. The stereotypical miser \u2013 who\u2019s a grouch and a Grinch and thoroughly unlikable \u2013 like Shylock and Scrooge \u2013 just doesn\u2019t exist anymore. These days, you\u2019ve got to have a lot of charm and seductiveness to succeed in the board room. You\u2019re charming on the outside, but completely closed in your soul. Once I cracked that, the other pieces of the puzzle started sliding into place quite nicely.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
That sounds kind of familiar \u2013 like a certain American president, perhaps?<\/h4>\n\n\n\n
Well, to some extent, yes. Donald Trump doesn\u2019t give a damn about you as a human being \u2013 he just wants to be able to buy and sell you. But he\u2019s also pathetic because he\u2019s quite desperate to be liked. Scrooge, as I envision him, has no such pretensions. He\u2019ll charm you to get his way, but he doesn\u2019t care about being liked. So take the twisted soul of Trump, add the hard shell and blunt charisma of Lee Kuan Yew, and maybe a dash of Kim Jong Un. [laughs]<\/p>\n\n\n\n The original intention of A Christmas Carol <\/em>is to wake its readers up \u2013 if any part of you is like Scrooge, you\u2019re supposed to take the story as a warning to shake that off. But I don\u2019t think a Scrooge in the classic style would connect with Singapore audiences. If I gave you a miserly grouch, I\u2019d reach nobody. Everyone would just say: \u201cThat\u2019s not me.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n So, in reinventing Scrooge, I also had to find the different spices to add to the mix that would make this Scrooge more relatable to Singaporeans from different cultures and religions and with different perspectives on life. For me, that link comes in the way we\u2019ve all been trained for success in Singapore. We\u2019re always told to keep our eyes on the prize, to switch off parts of ourselves, to sacrifice parts of our souls to achieve success. That happens to pretty much all Singaporeans, without even thinking about it. We can so easily become Scrooge. And I think that will be relevant for everyone in the audience.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Yes, because I feel like we\u2019ll be reinventing Sebastian too \u2013 we\u2019re taking the Broadway and the Beng away from Broadway Beng! Sebastian\u2019s charm as an actor is that he\u2019s so warm and open and generous. What would it be like when he plays someone so cold and twisted and sociopathic? For Scrooge, Sebastian will have to turn the tap on his famous charisma and let it flow \u2013 but for it to run cold instead of warm! What\u2019s fascinating to me is that I can\u2019t predict how he will play the part. And that kind of uncharted territory is tremendously exciting for me as a playwright and an audience member!<\/p>\n\n\n\n Hossan and I go back such a long way. We met in the cast of Gurmit\u2019s World <\/em>\u2013 a TV sketch comedy show that gave birth to Phua Chua Kang way back when. And he was my Chestnuts<\/em> partner for a few years. So I know how he works, and I also know he understands my writing. That means I get to really focus on developing the characters on the page. I\u2019m not afraid to write more complexity into the script, because I know Hossan will enjoy it. I\u2019m confident he will add flash and bang and colour to the show without losing the thread of what\u2019s going on at a deeper level.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It might sound strange coming from half a humbug like myself, but I have missed the element of Christmas in W!LD RICE\u2019s recent pantomimes. Over the past few years, the company has really experimented with adapting non-traditional stories as pantomimes, which is great. But, since we\u2019re tackling such an iconic Christmas story this year, I\u2019m glad I have the opportunity to infuse the pantomime with Christmas again!<\/p>\n\n\n\n To be clear, I don\u2019t mean turkey and mistletoe and all of that. It\u2019s not about what Christmas looks <\/em>like, but what it feels <\/em>like. It\u2019s that sense of communal spirit that you also get at festive occasions like Diwali, Chinese New Year and Hari Raya. It\u2019s about huddling up together and sharing something \u2013 an experience, a story that we tell ourselves about what it means to be us. So I\u2019m hoping that the show will be fun and snarky and a little bitchy, but that you\u2019ll also feel warm, fuzzy and maybe cry a tear or two of joy at the end!<\/p>\n\n\n\n A $ingapore Carol<\/em> plays at Victoria Theatre from 23 November to 15 December 2018! Find out more here<\/a>! <\/strong> Christmas is a time of tradition and familiarity \u2013 isn\u2019t it? Not if playwright Jonathan Lim has anything to say about it! Read on to find out how he\u2019ll be shaking things up in A $ingapore Carol!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4820,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"none","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[10],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/glutenfreepleasure.com\/__proxy_domain\/www.wildrice.com.sg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4822"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/glutenfreepleasure.com\/__proxy_domain\/www.wildrice.com.sg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/glutenfreepleasure.com\/__proxy_domain\/www.wildrice.com.sg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glutenfreepleasure.com\/__proxy_domain\/www.wildrice.com.sg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glutenfreepleasure.com\/__proxy_domain\/www.wildrice.com.sg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4822"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/glutenfreepleasure.com\/__proxy_domain\/www.wildrice.com.sg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4822\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glutenfreepleasure.com\/__proxy_domain\/www.wildrice.com.sg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4820"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/glutenfreepleasure.com\/__proxy_domain\/www.wildrice.com.sg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4822"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glutenfreepleasure.com\/__proxy_domain\/www.wildrice.com.sg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4822"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glutenfreepleasure.com\/__proxy_domain\/www.wildrice.com.sg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4822"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Jonathan](\"https:\/\/glutenfreepleasure.com\/__proxy_domain\/www.wildrice.com.sg\/wr\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/images_BLOG_Jonathan_2.png\")
How are you bringing this very British story closer to home?<\/h4>\n\n\n\n
Sebastian Tan will be playing Scrooge. Is that exciting for you?<\/h4>\n\n\n\n
What\u2019s it been like working with your director, Hossan Leong?<\/h4>\n\n\n\n
It\u2019s been almost ten years since you\u2019ve written a W!LD RICE pantomime. What are you hoping to bring with you to A $ingapore Carol<\/em> this year?<\/h4>\n\n\n\n
<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"