Charles Dickens Performs a Christmas Carol

This short film evokes the audience experience of anticipation at a night out at the Athenaeum Theatre in Melbourne, overlaid with an otherworldly Victorian feel which matches the ghostly theme of ‘Charles Dickens Performs A Christmas Carol’. Our video unpacks the stage show, provides some performance snippets, gives some background for audiences, and features interviews with director James Adler and star Phil Zachariah. Since being embedded on the Charles Dickens Performs web site the video has been a great resource for the theatre company as they roll out their marketing and promotions for the production each year.

We made use of our interview with Phil Zachariah, and his knowledge of Dickens, for our micro-documentary about the phenomenon of Charles Dickens the performer. While this also acted as a resource for Eagles Nest Theatre in promoting the show, it had an appeal to a broader audience interested in Charles Dickens. The film had success in 2012, the bicentenary of Dickens’s birth, when a Washington Post blog embedded it in an online post noting many things Dickens. Viewing figures steadily increased as the global #Dickens2012 festival began and the world collectively celebrated Dickens.