This evening we watched A Christmas Carol on the TV, and it was the 1999 version which I had never even heard about before with Patrick Stewart as Scrooge and Richard E. Grant as Bob Cratchit.

Having seen Patrick Stewart do his one-man show of this about ten years ago at the Old Vic I reckoned it would be pretty good and so it was. At the end I was kicking myself for not trying to get tickets for his show at the Albury this year.

I did not know how much Jayne likes this story, although she is more used to seeing the Alastair Sim version. Had I known I really would have got tickets.

You could see how Patrick Stewart had brought some of the touches from his own version to this one. The line “Are there no prisons? Are there no workhouses?” took me right back to the theatre. Personally I found the theatrical production more powerful since it was a bare stage and everything was evoked by the language and delivery, but this kept more to the source material and the sets were stunning. I can’t believe they built it all but on the other hand I can’t believe they could find such excellent locations either.

Grant was a perfect Bob Cratchit, and although a couple of the special effects were a little ropey most were spot on.

I just could not help thinking what a socialist sub-text there was to it, but I always think of Dickens as having a strong socialist message, so the whole thing was very appropriate, what with Jesus obviously being a socialist as well. Or is that a little controversial?