Trekies unite. If you’ve had it with the same, old rendition of Dickens’ classic A Christmas Carol (I can’t say that this reporter has) there’s an alternative to be had, and you’ll find it in the Chicago area. Through Dec. 30th Commedia Beauregard is presenting the blockbuster variant of the traditional seasonal play at the Raven Theatre. See this and you’ll never quite see Dickens the same way.
This show is performed “in the original Klingon with English supertitles” according to Commedia Beauregard. The raison de etre of this remake of ghosts and redemption has been “adapted to reflect the Warrior Code of Honor,” and then the whole thing’s been artfully, laboriously translated into thlIngan Hol. For the less than thoroughly initiated among us, that’s the Klingon Language. Genteel it is not. Lots of guttural gnashing of teeth, and thrashing about of the tongue.
For those who need more than supertitles to keep up there’s a narrative analysis from The Vulcan Institute of Cultural Anthropology.
Our suggestion: read Dickens’ classic, see a traditional production and then dive head-first into this one. Christopher Kidder-Mostrom and Sasha Walloch crafted A Klingon Christmas Carol. They’re the playwrights. Laura Thurston and Bill Hedrick joined with Kidder-Mostrom in the translation.
Translation is part of the point at Commedia Beauregard, a non-profit theater company that produces works in the Chicago and Minneapolis/Saint Paul areas.
You’ll find the Raven Theater at 6157 North Clark Street. The Star Trekian/Dickensonian takeoff on A Christmas Carol is just another sign that the people of America’s so-called ‘Second City’ really do get it when it comes to putting on compelling theater.
(Featured image by Photo Credit: Scott Pakudaitis / Mr. Guy F. Wicke)
